


always just on the outskirts

by myhandisempty



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Canon-Typical Ableism, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-01
Updated: 2016-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-24 05:45:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 52,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4907659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myhandisempty/pseuds/myhandisempty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, but Mox has never claimed to be very good at geometry. He’s always preferred chemistry, something he seems to have plenty of with Leakee. Plus, there’s something to be said for finding your way back to a place you never thought you’d be. He’d rather take the scenic route, anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. you know we're gonna be legends

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a one-shot, like what would a meet cute look like with two total asshole tools, but it's quickly turned into much more. Takes place in some combination of alternate universe and actual events, basically blended together in whatever mishmash I want.
> 
> This is proofread by myself, all mistakes are mine.

There’s a clock on the wall across from him, some ancient analog face with hands pointing to the nine and twelve. He’s not sure how he got here, tattered sofa upholstery under his cheek, and where _here_ is is hazy as the smoke-filled air as well. Some house party after his match earlier, plenty of douchey frat boys everywhere he turns. Fucking Sami’s idea, probably. Not sure where he is, either, but probably around somewhere.

 

But what Mox does remember are his words, spoken over the tail end of the guy next to him’s derision. “Nex’ one,” he’d slurred, righting his drink quickly when he tipped it dangerously to the side, licking up the neck of the bottle to catch the spilled droplets before they fell. “Next person through that door, I’ll show you. Can charm the pants offa anyone. I’ll get ‘em in bed. You’ll see.”

 

Everything’s a blur of light, indistinct colors shifting into each other. There’s already a pleasant buzz in his veins, the post-match high, only heightened by the alcohol he’s downed, when he sees him. Everything’s a relaxing gray, soft and muted, mellow around his heavy body, when suddenly bright, bright color. It’s startling, blinding him for a moment, and Mox closes his eyes and growls before peering over again. Guy’s still there, but looking at him a second time is a little easier, more of a glow than a blazing light. He’s glancing around the room, definitely seems unimpressed with whatever he sees.

 

Everything’s blurry, but even Mox knows, looking at the stranger, that he can’t say the same.

 

A quick turn around, and the tall frame disappears back through the doorway. Mox blinks once, twice, tries to clear the sunspots from his eyes. A hand claps him heavily on the shoulder. He bares his teeth before shaking it off. “There ya go, champ,” that guy next to him is laughing again. Looks like a total dickbag, wearing a fucking polo and everything. “Good luck with him.”

 

“Good fuckin’ luck enjoying fantasies while I go out and get the real thing,” Mox clenches his hand and makes to jerk himself, rolling his hips up and into his fist, punctuating it with an “Unh! Unh!” Dickbag Polo shoots him a disgusted glare, and Mox slaps the side of his face a couple times with a laugh. Kid might be fun, if there weren’t bigger and brighter things waiting for him outside this room. He manages to stumble to his feet, slow and sluggish, and chase the trail of fading light out the door. Doesn’t realize he’s drifting, leaning to one side until his shoulder slams into the doorway.

 

The impact makes him scowl, sours his mood a little. He fishes a lone, crumpled cigarette out of his pocket and lights it, sucking in the bitter coffee taste. Soothes him enough to remember he’s on a mission. Right. His glance flickers around the room, but the fuzzy glow isn’t anywhere to be seen. There’s a quiet looking room behind a slightly cracked door, and Moxley pushes it open to glance, before sliding inside with a smirk, closing it behind him. Bingo.

 

It’s a kitchen, just the two of them in here. Must have been the lights playing tricks, that brightness, because up close, he can see the dude’s face, his eyes as dark as the rest of him. The jackass has sunglasses hooked in his shirt, despite the fact that they’re inside and it must be near midnight. He’s sitting at the table, beer sitting in front of him, and Moxley grabs one of the other chairs, straddles it to sit the wrong way around. He takes another drag.

 

“Not into the celebrations?” he asks, letting the smoke drift out between the words. Big Guy squints at the cigarette unhappily but stays silent about it, glancing back down at the the phone he’s playing around with.

 

“I’m just waiting on some friends, so I can get out of here.”

 

“Oh, don’t wanna go home alone, huh? I can help with that. I’m more than willing. I’ll get you in bed, tuck you in real nice and everything.” He leers at the stranger, barely restraining himself from licking his lips. Maybe he does, a little. Over the top, probably, but he can’t quite bring himself to care.

 

“Are you serious, right now?” That gaze flicks back up to Moxley’s face and sticks there, like it hadn’t really looked at or taken him in until now. Mox smiles big and wide back, perfectly aware that it shows off his dimples to their best advantage. Makes him seem less threatening. Or so he’s heard. Not that this guy needs to worry about that—he looks pretty menacing on his own. “Ain’t there anyone else here that’s caught your eye so you can leave me alone?”

 

Mox smile falls a little at that. “C’mon, you honestly saying I haven’t caught _yours_?” The more he thinks about it, the more indignant he becomes. He’s easily of a higher caliber than any other guy he’s seen here, and most likely than any of the ladies, too. Another drag of the cigarette in his now shaking hand helps to calm him—the dim overhead light flickers as he blows the smoke straight at this guy’s face. Most of it ultimately dissipates before it reaches its target. “I’m a veritable banquet for the eyes.”

 

Said eyes sweep over him once more and the stare turns dark before it’s directed away from him and back at that phone. “Yeah, a banquet of moldy bread crusts and stale beer, maybe.”

 

Mox is actually left speechless for a moment. Never before has he been so insulted in his own house—any house, he amends silently, though, honestly, any house he steps into is his house. And by a complete stranger, even. This utter asshole glances back up at him with a completely dismissive air and asks, “You still here?”

 

He reaches over the table, at risk of tipping himself all the way out of this rickety chair, and snatches the damn phone out of the guy’s hands. Over the tail end of his enraged _hey!_ , Mox slams it down on the table and falls back into his seat. “You can have this back when you start appreciating the gift of my presence, which I am generously giving you.” He has this hulking man’s attention now, fully on him. He has a feeling that glare wouldn’t be reduced any by the sunglasses he’s wearing by not wearing.

 

“Wasn’t aware I should be concerned with the offerings of ants.” And Mox is laughing, he can’t stop fucking laughing because he’s so infuriated and he’s so horny and this guy’s voice has the unique quality of sounding so smooth but somehow exactly like a fork scraped over a glass and he’s not sure there’s anything perfect in the world, but this moment is a close contender.

 

“You fucking prick. Awfully high and mighty, full of yourself, aren’t you? What are you compensating for?” His cigarette has burnt so low that it’s starting to singe his fingers. What a waste. He puts it out on the table, watching the dark, ashy burn mark form.

 

The guy is still looking at him disapprovingly, and it only gets worse after that display. Mox wonders if that’s his default setting, or if it’s all just for him. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

 

And the thing is, yeah, Mox would, and this dude doesn’t seem the least bit disinterested anymore, engaging in whatever this is with him. This weird, competitive, reverse flirting. Mox shifts on the unforgiving wood against his ass, realizes with a start that he’s half hard already. Wonders if Tall, Dark and Haughty is, too.

 

“Okay, okay, enough,” he starts, with the (mostly) full intention of making peace between them, he _swears_ , but the rest comes out anyway, “Think we got off on the wrong dick.” Harsh Gaze over there looks incredulous, that ever present frown deepening.

 

“Uh, you sure you don’t mean wrong foot?” he asks, and Mox grins toothily at him.

 

“Nah, I meant wrong dick. But I would still like to get off on yours.” Guy’s eyes widen momentarily before he grins and stifles a laugh, eyes down and away, shakes his head and smoothes his face immediately after like he’s trying to hide it. It’s one part annoying and three parts charming, and Mox hates absolutely all of it. “I’m Jon. Moxley. You?”

 

There’s a pause that seems to stretch out for several minutes while those dark eyes stare at him, trying to puzzle out if this is some kind of trap, and obviously it is, because Mox has no intention of leaving here without him. But he can see the instant the change occurs, when something in that intense face shifts and locks into place, knows he’s said or done something right and he’s been granted access, now. “Leakee,” he says eventually, shaking a couple pieces of hair out of his eyes. Those things look like they could stare through solid steel. His lips feel dry. He licks them a little.

 

“Seriously? Is that your first name?” he asks, eyebrows furrowed in confusion, leaning further over the back of the chair. The two legs behind him raise off the ground. Feels like he’s going to spill out onto the table at any second. “Last name? Or is it, like, one name? Like Bono? Because if so, man, I don’t think you pull it off.”

 

Leakee stares at him, unamused, because apparently the guy’s as hot-and-cold as the showers in Moxley’s shitty motel rooms. “It’s a last name. Nobody calls me by my first name.”

 

“Which is?” Moxley presses, though it doesn’t matter in the slightest. He doesn’t know why he’s still in this uncomfortable wooden chair, talking to Leakee, when there are probably twenty other people at this party he could fuck with a quarter of the effort he’s putting in here. But, well, he made a bet. And he’s ice cold in everything he does. He doesn’t lose. “C’mon, I showed you mine,” he whines with a little laugh when Leakee hesitates.

 

He breathes out slowly, like he’s facing the executioner’s block. Really, unless it’s Francis or some shit, the nerves really aren’t necessary. It’s like pulling fucking teeth with this guy. “Roman,” he says, not dropping eye contact with Mox for a second. “It’s Roman.”

 

Mox takes in Leakee’s statuesque face, what looks like it could be a very nice physique under the ridiculous jacket he’s wearing, and scoffs. “Yeah. Yeah, of course it fuckin’ is.”

 

He rests his head on top of his arms, gazes over at Leakee who does not appear to understand the obvious. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

 

“Nothing. Just, you look like you could be a marble carving of a gladiator or a god or some shit, I don’t know. A god that will be praying to me, tonight.”

 

“Oh, my God,” Leakee mumbles under his breath, “not giving this up, are you?” He leans across the table, gets closer to Mox than he has been so far. “You’re pretty confident about that, considering you haven’t even bought me a drink or dinner.” And Mox has been fighting his whole life, one way or another—he’s well aware of what a challenge sounds like when he hears it. It’s his time to strike.

 

He lets out a hum that could be construed as agreement. “Might. You’re still leaving with me, either way.”

 

There’s another long pause while Leakee considers this. He’s thinking about it entirely too much when it’s just about two hot dudes getting off. There’s a huff of breath right before he finally answers, disgusted with himself, maybe. “Okay.”

 

They don’t stop for anymore beer and there are no diners open, but Leakee leads him to a little house a couple blocks away anyway, climbing the creaky steps of the front porch. Leakee puts his key in the lock, twists it, and—nothing. He repeats the motion again, but the key doesn’t turn. The cool October night air is blowing down the back of Moxley’s shirt, raising goosebumps on his arms.

 

“How much did you fuckin’ drink, anyway?” he scowls, snatching the key and trying it for himself. It’s stuck in place. Leakee glares at him as he wiggles it back and forth.

 

“Apparently too much, if I’m letting strays follow me home.”

 

Mox gives the key a hard twist once more, but to no avail. They’re locked out. He can tell a lot of stories, Mox can, but he never thought there would come a time when he would be cockblocked by a door.

 

Throwing his head back in frustration, he catches sight of the window above the awning, open to let the mid-autumn breeze in. He quirks his mouth for a second, trying to calculate the distance.

 

“Boost me,” he demands, turning back to Leakee, who’s pinning him with a stare that says he in no way plans to.

 

“Not a chance,” he confirms, shaking his head. “I’m not giving you free reign in my house to steal shit or whatever.” He’s shaking in his own jacket, however, and the temperature seems to be dropping by the minute. Mox could take him back to the motel, but, well, he’s a little turned around and is going to have enough trouble finding it on his own _without_ constant nagging at his side, and it’s fucking cold and he wants to be indoors _now_.

 

“Jesus Christ, do you wanna get into the place or not?” he asks, stomping his feet to try and warm his legs. Leakee regards him much like a parent watching a toddler’s tantrum they’ve seen fifty times over. “You have, what, fifty pounds on me, champ? You ain’t comin’ anywhere near my shoulders.” He rubs his hands together, wishes he hadn’t wasted his last cigarette.

 

For someone so contrary, Leakee’s resolve is remarkably weak. Two minutes later, Mox has one foot in his palm and both hands gripping the hopefully sturdy windowsill. He’s not ready when Leakee shoves him upward, launching him halfway through the opening, his stomach landing hard on the bottom edge and knocking the wind out of him. He claws himself through the window, rolling into the empty bedroom, and lies on the floor, trying to catch his breath again. Outside, there’s a hissing sound, and he’s not sure if Leakee’s snickering at him or if it’s just the wind in the leaves.

 

When he gets to his feet, Mox surveys the room in the darkness. Clean, mostly empty, pretty bare. A temporary dwelling, at best. There’s a dim light coming from the hallway, illuminating several necklaces on the wooden dresser across from the foot of the bed, and the pendant dangling from one leather strap catches his eye. Like two cups next to each other. He wasn’t going to take anything, but this is cool, and if he’s going to be treated with nothing but suspicion, Mox would rather earn it. He pockets the thing.

 

When he finds his way to the front door and pulls it open, Leakee rushes through as if he'd been pressed against the wood, listening for every move Mox was making. He nearly tumbles to the floor under the sudden weight, catching his balance on the couch behind him.

 

“Oof. You’re a little pushy, anyone ever tell you?” Moxley makes a show of brushing off his jacket after he rights himself, but Leakee grabs the collar of it and reels him in for a kiss. It’s rough and angry, as if he’s upset that Mox came around and ruined a perfectly good evening of sitting around being antisocial and miserable, but Mox didn’t ask him to come walking into that living room just then. He could have left Leakee alone, if he hadn’t. He could have let him be.

 

“Think that’s you,” Leakee mutters, backing Mox against the sofa again and pushing his jacket down his shoulders. “Was enjoying my night until you strong-armed me into this.”

 

Mox snorts, pulling at Leakee’s jacket in turn. “Yeah, right, seemed like it. And now you’re gonna love it, so. You’re welcome.” He dives in to steal another kiss, dragging the sleeves down, running his hands over Leakee’s arms after the extra fabric is removed. What he finds gives him pause.

 

He tears his mouth away when it begins to run again. “You _asshole_. Fucking chiseled Roman granite muscled motherfucker.”

 

He doesn’t even know what words his lips are forming—Leakee’s hands moving up under his t-shirt don’t help with it any. Mox is hardly one to lose his mind over a few nearly chaste touches, but the slow speed with which Leakee’s fingers drag across his lower stomach is the worst good thing he’s felt in recent memory. Mox groans when short fingernails dig into the sensitive flesh there.

 

Leakee is smug, not just the look on his face but the entire air surrounding him, and those sunglasses are still, amazingly enough, hooked in his shirt. Mox grabs at them, puts them on his own face and pulls Leakee into another kiss, ignoring the nosepads smashing into his face. The edge of discomfort, little bursts of pain, just helps the whole thing feel more real.

 

When they break apart again, both panting harshly, Leakee rips the glasses off his face and drops them gently on the floor. “You in the habit of touching things that aren’t yours?” He pulls Mox’s shirt off, his palm resting against the base of his throat. It sends a thrill up his spine.

 

“I’ve got my hands all over you, don’t I?” To prove his point, he pushes Leakee’s shirt up and over his head, dropping it to the ground. Pauses again, distracted by the tattoo he uncovers. “The hell is this?” Mox asks, tracing over the triangles on his shoulder. The thing is tribal, bold lines interlocking intricately, flowing seamlessly, and he gets the distinct impression that it’s not something someone like him should be touching. He keeps his fingers there, anyway.

 

“Just a tribal tattoo. Samoan.” The way Leakee says it, a little guarded, eyes somewhere else when he glances up, gives Mox the impression that it’s far from _just_ a tattoo.

 

He lets his fingertip errantly trace a band once more. “Cool.” But it’s time to get back to business. Short work is made of his belt, and the jeans he was wearing pool on the floor with it. He’s about to return the favor, finally get them both naked, when Leakee suddenly shoves him over the back of the sofa.

 

Mox can’t quite catch himself on the seat, flips onto the floor in front of it. “Fuckin’ ow, what the hell is wrong with you?” he complains loudly, but his mouth goes a little dry when Leakee walks around toward him, hands pushing his own jeans off his hips slow and dirty. He’s not laughing out loud at Mox, but by the time he’s dropping to his knees on the floor, too, Mox can see his eyes are.

 

His answer is simply pulling Mox’s black briefs down and off, fucking _finally_ , casting them aside where Mox sees he’s laid a condom he must have pulled from his pocket or something. He takes his own off, but Mox starts growling up at him, because he has an awful fucking lot of skin on display and none of it is being touched.

 

When those hands are on him again, they’re slow and forceful along his sides, across his nipple, and what little patience he had saved up breaks. “Oh my God, would you just fucking touch me already?” Mox snaps, trying to dig his torso further into the floor and his hips up. Leakee scowls at him but finally acquiesces, wrapping a big hand around his cock and giving it a few strokes. He leans down to suck a bruise into Mox’s hip, and when his hand squeezes just right, Mox lets out this completely whorish moan that may have been humiliating if he had any shame to speak of. Leakee looks up with a grin.

 

“You know, you’re embarrassingly easy. Let someone hurl insults at you for twenty minutes and beg for dick anyw--”

 

Mox grabs the back of Leakee’s head by his hair, hovering just over the head of his cock, and pushes him down onto it. His mouth is so wet and hot, and better put to use this way. “I’m sorry, what was that?” He can’t get the rest of his smart ass comment out, though, because after leveling another glare at him—those are quickly losing their effectiveness—Leakee fucking gets after it, a combination of hand, tongue, and the slightest hint of teeth that’s just not quite enough. The scrape of them against his cock makes Mox wish for bite marks over the rest of his body.

 

When his hand wraps itself a little too tightly in Leakee’s hair, he pulls off, and Mox groans at the loss of his mouth. He’s rewarded, though, with the feel of fingers skirting across the v of his hip and down across his inner thigh, tips pressing against him. Something’s missing, though. “Lube?” he asks, as Leakee blinks down at him, looking wide-eyed and prettier than he has any right to. “Don’t mind it burning, but I don’t fucking want it to hurt.”

 

“It’s upstairs,” Leakee replies, looking equal parts startled and chagrined. And he fucking should, with Mox here under him practically dying to get boned for the first time in months. “I could go get it, but I didn’t think you’d want me to interrupt.” His hips have been moving in a gentle rock against Mox ever since he stopped sucking him off and moved further up his body, his cock rubbing against Mox’s thigh almost, almost like he’s fucking him already, and he guesses he can see Leakee’s point.

 

“Fine,” he sighs, and pulls Leakee’s hand up to his mouth, nearly causing the other man to collapse on top of him. He sucks the two longest fingers into his mouth, coats them with saliva, and is pleasantly surprised when Leakee doesn’t look at him with disgust. His eyes are darker than they were before, and they’re intent on Mox’s face, so he makes a show of it, moving them in and out, dragging his tongue up the side.

 

He drops the hand when he’s done, and a few seconds later, a finger presses against him. "You know," he says, before another movement can be made, "I'm not some fucking virgin. You can go get that lube, now."

 

Leakee grumbles to himself as he gets up, and Mox watches his ass disappear up the stairs. Fucking beautiful. Makes him regret his earlier decision to get fucked, because that ass is screaming to be wrecked. Leakee is obviously confident, and with good reason. Doesn't mean Mox won't enjoy taking him down a few pegs.

 

He returns quickly enough, tube in hand, cock bobbing against his stomach as he walks. His body is glorious, better than those fucking statues and paintings and all that shit. Mox covets it in every possible way imaginable.

 

When Leakee drops to his knees in front of him again, eyes down turned to open the bottle but in a way that could be mistaken for submission, Mox groans loudly because there's only so many sights a man can take. Leakee glances up from in between Mox's thighs, fire in his eyes, and that's even hotter.

 

"Gonna blow your mind," he tells Leakee, who snorts as Mox shimmies down and presses his ass against his cock.

 

Leakee smirks down at him. "Is that so."

 

A finger presses into him without warning. It only pushes in a few times, barely enough to even get a feel for it, before the second one is joining it. _That_ takes his breath away—it really has been a long time since he’s been on this end. “Fuck,” he bites out, tries to make it sound sharp, “fuck, fuck, fuck,” until his lips are still moving but nothing is coming out anymore. Those fingers are scissoring inside of him, and when they curl just right, white hot stars burst in front of his open eyes and he remembers just how Leakee looked in that dirty, rundown living room. Immediately, the extremities disappear.

 

“Hands and knees,” Leakee demands after rolling the condom on, eyes narrowing when Mox doesn’t immediately comply. Leakee’s known him for, like, an hour and a half by now. He should know it’s not that easy.

 

“No way, I’m not turning my back to you,” Mox says, even though he doesn’t really give one shit about that. It just sounds like something Leakee would say, and he wants to spoil even a little bit of the other man’s enjoyment for making this so difficult. He doesn’t like the sensation of being this far underwater, out in the deep end. “I’ll ride you.”

 

Leakee just stares for a second, then scoffs. “I’m not getting rug burn all over my back for this.” Like it’s okay for Mox to. Par for the course, as far as he can tell. Another pause, for a moment, then, “Like this, I guess,” and lifts Mox’s legs up to rest over his shoulders.

 

“Woah ho ho,” Mox’s eyes widen at his new position. “Not that flexible, don’t really want to be broken in half.” Leakee actually looks like he’s gonna consider that, for a split second, before he bends down to kiss Mox again, folding him in the process.

 

“Think you’ll live,” he tells Mox, who’s feeling out of breath already, and, after a moment where the head of his dick slips over his hole, slides into him with one solid push. He’s vaguely aware of a strange choking sound that sounds like it’s coming from him. It’s too much too fast, stinging and burning a cadence of _goodfiregood_ up his spine, and a long, drawn-out moan escapes him. Leakee waits a few seconds, choosing now, of all times, to be a fucking gentleman, until Mox kicks his heel into the area where he thinks his kidney is and he gives a grunt before starting to move.

 

The _way_ he’s moving—it’s not _slow_ , but Mox doesn’t know what else to call it. Feels very deliberate without being methodical, like the emphatic way you press the pen into the very last period of a note you really, really mean. He’s not sure what _that_ means, whether it’s just Leakee’s style or if he just really, really wanted to fuck Mox. Because from this angle, the way he’s looking down at him, it seems a whole lot like the latter, and ever since that first flash of brightness, Mox really, really wanted to be fucked by him, too.

 

Leakee grabs his wrist and pins it down, though Mox isn’t going fucking anywhere, and his other hand is pressing against his lower stomach, balancing him. Their rhythm is gradually picking up speed and Leakee is screwing him deep enough he can’t quite catch his breath, hair falling in his face and those dark eyes watching him closely from behind it. Mox regrets not taking him up on his original suggestion for position, because it’s weird, being this close to Leakee’s face and looking into his eyes with Leakee looking back.

 

A hand wraps around his dick, timed _perfectly_ with his thrusts, because apparently everything about this asshole is as close to perfect as humanly possible. Mox isn’t going to be able to stand, tomorrow, but this makes it worth it--the ache of being filled with a nice dick, the pulls on his cock accompanied by slight twists of the wrist that’re so close to how he touches himself, the way it sparks in his veins and sets his teeth on edge and feels like his entire body is being touched.

 

“Yeah, yeah, right fuckin’ there,” he guides, his vision lit up by brightness every few strokes, and over the sound of blood rushing in his ears, he hears Leakee mutter something that sounds like _I know how to fuck_ , and, yeah, yeah, the man does.

 

Leakee is thrusting into him so forcefully it’s jarring his head around, pressing Mox’s imprint into the carpet, and Mox idly thinks how it’s good they’re not on a bed, it would probably break, and then Leakee would have to sleep on the floor and remember how _they’re_ sleeping on the floor, right now, which doesn’t sound so bad, actually, and he’d really like to be able to claim that he’d broken a bed, once, would add so much fuel to his future conquests—

 

Then Leakee tries to snap him in half, again, leaning far forward enough to rest his forearm over Mox’s throat. The pressure on his trachea is unsettling and hot when it’s already become hard to breathe, he can’t concentrate on anything but the waves of _good_ radiating from low in his abdomen and it’s funny, he’s trying to force a giggle out but it won’t leave his mouth, and maybe there won’t be enough air to fill his lungs again when they’re done but it seems like he could survive anything, right now, and—

 

It’s over too soon, but not soon enough, and the combination of once again sucking air into his lungs coupled with the orgasm is as intense as anything he’s ever felt. Mox twists his head to the side, bites into Leakee’s arm as it braces him. Leakee strokes his cock a few more times, just before it becomes too sensitive, and whispers, “Y’like that, Jon?” like it’s a secret they share, like it would be okay to admit he did.

 

It’s the first time Leakee’s said his name, and it’s the wrong one. “No one calls me Jon,” he challenges, hard as it is to get words out in his current position. “‘S stupid. Call me Mox.”

 

Leakee’s laughing at him, Mox can tell before he even hears it, can feel it in his thrusts, says breathlessly right before he comes, “Jon.”

 

He dresses quickly, after, pulling on the armor of his clothing in the always awkward aftermath. Leakee’s stretched out on the couch when he breaks the silence. “Should we, like, exchange numbers or something?”

 

Moxley laughs, slides his shirt on over his head. “I’m just an ant with nothing to offer, aren’t I? And I don’t know that you’re worth remembering.” Which is a lie, he’s gonna remember being this thoroughly fucked for a long time, but when will he be in Georgia next? He’s never gonna see this guy again. “‘Sides, I won my bet, now. And you have a wacky story to tell your grandkids someday about that time you let some gutter trash break into your house.” He leans over the sofa and pinches Leakee’s cheek quick before he pulls back and away from Mox. There’s a storm brewing on his face. He doesn’t say anything, and it’s not the silence from earlier, charged with electric anticipation. Mox almost misses the derisive laughter.

 

“Get your lock checked, man. I’ll see myself out,” he calls over his shoulder, out of the front door before he has to hear any of the asshole comments at his expense.

  
He’s all the way to the main road before he realizes he doesn’t even know the guy he made that bet with.


	2. never gonna give you anything you expect

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First things first: due to some messages I've gotten re: this story on tumblr and the like, I want to clear something up. I absolutely don't want to feel like I'm misleading anyone, and I don't want anyone to feel misled! Therefore: this is not a Roman/Dean story. I probably shouldn't have tagged it with them, but I panicked and don't really want to change the tags now. This is a story in an alternate universe where Dean may or may not exist, but is not the same person as Jon Moxley, and Roman does not exist, because Leakee is living his life. They're different characters, and will be treated as such. If that's cool with you, awesome, read on, I'm so glad you like it! If that's not your cup of tea, I want to thank you for (I assume) making it through chapter one and enjoying it enough to continue. Hopefully you can find a story that's everything you're looking for.
> 
> Now that that's out of the way, I'm sorry this took so long. This chapter kicked. My. Ass. Even now, I feel it could be much better, but, even though I am normally a complete perfectionist, I just can't look at it anymore. I hope it's worth the wait. Chapter three will be delayed due to my busy personal life over the next couple weeks, but I'll get it up asap.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who gave me feedback and poured out kind words. I honestly didn't expect this much love for something I'm just writing for my own fun.

Mox always knows what to expect from his opponents. It’s his greatest strength—more than his athleticism, more than his ruthlessness in the ring. He likes that, likes knowing that anyone who faces him anticipates flailing hits and jerky movements and none of the strategy behind any of it. They don’t notice him watching all their matches and gathering intelligence like it’s what he gets paid in because they don’t want to. They want to label him a drunk, crazy psychopath, just like the commentators, like the crowds, like the entire rest of the fucking world, and who knows, maybe that part’s true too, maybe he doesn’t act like a normal person. But those normal people are all off living mediocre, mundane lives while he’s young and hot and the HWA motherfucking Heavyweight Champion, thank you very much, so what do they know, anyway?

 

What _Mox_ knows, what he always knows, is what he needs to do to dismantle his opponent. Does he always manage to pull it off? No—sometimes he goes out and wrestles a half hour match that feels like beating his head into a brick wall repeatedly, over and over and over again without respite. But he knows what he _should_ do, which always overlaps with what he can do, and that’s how he wins every match before even stepping foot in the ring.

 

So when they tell him that the challenger for his title, this upcoming Saturday, will be Rosey, three months removed from his career with WWE, Mox tries to get his head into the game. He really fucking tries. There are tapes and DVDs littering the dingy gray carpeting of the studio he’s currently living in, but every match that scrolled across the screen was little more than background noise for the colorful thoughts bouncing off the walls of his brain because this. Is. Bullshit.

 

Whatever excuse Rosey has for coming into his ring, his town, his company, and trying to take something that belongs to him, that’s a part of him, it’s all bullshit. If he got kicked out of WWE for being a terrible wrestler, that’s his business, that’s between him and some corporate entity, but he can find his own promotion to go to, or he can start from the bottom in this one. He hasn’t earned jack shit in HWA, let alone a title shot against the very best they have to offer. Mox has spent the last two years getting to this point. He has no reason to respect anyone that hasn’t done the same.

 

But their match is happening, regardless of his feelings, in a few hours. So long as the guy doesn’t splash all four hundred pounds on top of him, there’s nothing that’s going to keep him from winning. Doesn't matter how much study he's done.

 

He's dropped all his things in the locker room, and is wandering around to get a feel for the space. Mox has gotten used to wrestling in unfamiliar buildings, but there's still a weird disconnect when he fights anywhere but the HWA warehouse. And maybe it's stupid to think of it as a hometown advantage, because they’re all wrestling there, but it's not like anyone else owns that ring. It's all his.

 

He enters the main gym area through the open door, sunlight spilling in after him. Rosey is already here, against the opposite wall, talking to some guy wearing a black tank top, dark hair pulled back. His back’s to Mox, but his shoulder is sporting a pretty rad tattoo, elaborate black lines and shading and get a load of those delts and—wait. His eyes shift back to the ink. He’s seen similar tattoos, but this one, Mox has the strangest sense of deja vu, feels like he’s dug his fingers into that woven pattern, and—holy shit.

 

He can’t help the smirk that slides across his face as he saunters over in their general direction, not that he really wants to. Rosey’s eyes pass over him for the briefest of seconds and something passes over his face like a frown, but meaner. Rosey pats the guy he’s talking to on the shoulder—he has no reason to be positive, but he knows, he’s sure he _knows_ —and walks toward Mox like he’s going to engage him, but for once, Mox isn’t interested in getting in his opponents’ face, dragging them with his words. If he’s friends with tat guy—if tat guy is Georgia guy, one night stand guy, good enough sex to keep him warm on a lonely night guy—who is obviously a piece, then that’s two birds with one stone, as far as Mox is concerned. He could just orchestrate it so that Rosey sees them leave together—mind games with minimal effort, and hopefully a shiny new memory to add to his own personal porn collection. At the very least, getting off to a nice visual.

 

He blows past the big, angry Samoan, not even so much as raising his hand in lazy, mocking salute, which is a psychological manipulation all its own, one that Mox should think about employing more often. It’s just that it’s so hard to pretend he doesn’t care, isn’t fascinated by the way people implode in on themselves when he uses harsh words, watch it all come exploding back out of them, tenfold, the last bright flare of a dying star. Rosey just brushes it off, continues on his way—there are enough people around that maybe he thinks Mox is looking for someone else. And he is, eyes only for the man in front of him, who sinks into one of the chairs next to him and leans his head forward into his hands.

 

Mox slows his approach, now. He’s fucking holding his breath, drawing out the anticipation as long as he can until it buzzes, warm, in his gut. He can’t remember the last time he was so excited for something that had nothing to do with the ring.

 

( _Except it does_ , he reminds himself. It’s all just a game.)

 

He pulls a chair over with him, sets it up right next to the guy and falls into it. He wishes he could keep his eyes trained forward for as long as it takes, but the pressure’s become too much, and they dart over to the face beside him. He knew it. He fucking knew it. “Can I help—”

 

The guy cuts off mid sentence when he looks over at Mox, who has to suppress the tingling that travels down his spine. He remembers that voice, the low cadence of it admonishing him. It was hot. It was so hot. He wants to hear it again. Leakee—there’s the name, he’d been trying to recall—obviously remembers, too, the way his eyes narrow.

 

“Miss me, babe?”

 

It’s probably not an appropriate way to greet a guy he screwed once last fall and never saw again, but if Mox worried about things like that, well. If he worried about anything at all, it would make life a lot fucking shorter and a lot less fun.

 

Leakee’s nostrils flare, and it’s a decidedly unattractive look for him, until Mox notices the way the annoyance spreads across his face, becomes anger in the downturn of his mouth, edges toward rage by the time it reaches his eyes. It makes his smile pull that much wider, sharper, across his face.

 

He wonders if Leakee is even going to say anything, if he’ll have to just keep talking and talking to fill the silence, but when words come, they aren’t what he expects. “Never mentioned you were a wrestler.”

 

It's not a great technique to keep the upper hand. If roles were reversed, he wouldn't have let on that Leakee was even a flicker of a memory to him.

 

Then again, Leakee doesn't even look particularly surprised to see him, which is an interesting concept that Mox doesn't know what to do with. Means he came in spite of the fact that he expected Mox to be here. Maybe even because of it. That Leakee knows something about him when he knows next to nothing about the other man.

 

Maybe Leakee is a little better at this game than he seems.

 

“You never asked. I can hardly be blamed for your lack of interest in my fascinating life. Though it is understandable." He puts on his best commiserating look, frowns with every ounce of faux empathy he can muster. "I mean, my dick is a distraction at the best of times. You were there—you know.”

 

“What I know is that last I saw you, _Jon_ , you were running out of my house to get away.” Leakee is looking straight at him. His eyes are very—intense isn’t strong enough. They’re very fierce, trying to be calm but failing. Mox has _offended_ him. This is personal, to Leakee, and Mox is a little stunned to realize that. He knew, coming over here, that he’d be digging himself out of a hole. He has to start from scratch, winning over Leakee—if he ever really did in the first place, before—because he never expected a gift like this to be dropped right in his lap. It’s fun to tear things to shreds for the hell of it, because it doesn’t matter. And this was nothing to begin with, doesn’t matter, either, but he’s interested to know if it’s as enjoyable to piece the rubble he’s left in his wake back together. Either way, it will be a challenge. “So, you know, if you could do that again, now, that’d be great.”

 

“You’re in _my_ house, now, sweetheart. Only one’s leaving is you.” Even as he says it, he’s half worried he’ll chase Leakee away, that he’ll actually take Mox up on it and storm out. Which wouldn’t be the end of the world, or anything, but he lets out a shaky breath when the other man doesn’t move a muscle. “‘Sides, if you really wanted me gone, we both know you could be berating enough to sound like you mean it.”

 

“Don’t talk like you know me.” God, he sounds so serious and cold, completely different from the serious and cold way he addressed Mox when they first met. It’s weird, how he can tell the difference. The tone of voice is almost the same, but something’s just—off. This whole thing is ridiculous. He’s not going to apologize for running his mouth like he does every single day of his life. If people want to take him seriously, that’s their problem.

 

“Look, you do seem to be the same prick I remember, I recall something about the disdainful staredown.” The look on Leakee’s face, if possible, becomes even more contemptuous. There’s a sudden flash in his mind, an image of Leakee pulling his head back roughly by his hair, that expression on his face, harsh, humiliating words pouring out of him. Mox’s mouth goes dry for a second before he recovers. “Yeah, like that, exactly. So I’d like to take this opportunity to remind you that our cocks have been in each other’s orifices. I think I know you intimately.”

 

Leakee’s face does the most complicated thing, this wry twist of his lips and that outrage still simmering in his eyes. He drops his head and gives a long-suffering sigh, as if he’s known Mox for the amount of time it would require to truly despise the words that come out of his mouth. “Are you even a real person? You do understand that actual human beings don’t say shit like that.”

 

Mox grabs his crotch through his pants and leers at Leakee. “One hundred percent—”

 

“Don’t. Don’t you dare finish that thought.”

 

He grins widely, even though Leakee’s glanced away and is refusing to even look at him, now. Mox wonders what he’s thinking, if it’s even possible for anyone to tell most of the time. He probably comes across as snappish and lofty when he’s making his grocery list. If Mox had to guess, he’d title this expression ‘outrageously charmed and blown away by charisma but ignoring it until it goes away’. He’ll take the compliment, thank you very fucking much.

 

“Look, I guess I know just enough about you to know you’re not easy to deter. So, let’s get whatever this is over.” Leakee looks back over at him, most of the anger wiped from his face. It makes these lines appear under his eyes, like Mox’s presence itself is wearing him down. “You have something that belongs to me.”

 

Mox has to think about that for a while before he makes the connection. He’s tapping his fingers against his leg, runs one hand over the area between his shoulder and neck before it clicks. “What, that necklace? Call it a souvenir.” He fully means that—he’s held onto the necklace these last few months, at one time (alright, maybe two) even jerked off with it clenched in his other hand as some sort of physical connection to the memories he used to get off, and if Leakee knew that, he probably would never want to touch the thing again, anyway. But when Leakee glares at him, Mox backpedals a little. There’s an opportunity, here—this is a way to hook him. “Okay, okay, I'll give it back. But, it's in my bag back at the hotel I'm crashing at. If you want it, you have to come with me.”

 

Leakee is watching him warily, but also a little bit like he expected no different from him. Which is good, because, as Mox pointed out, they know each other better than Leakee thinks. Well enough, at least, to enjoy the finer points of each others’ company. The guy might be infuriating, but he seems to be intelligent, and his mouth is pretty smart, at times, too. That, combined with his obvious skills in more physical forms of entertainment, is enough for Mox to appreciate his presence, for now. Despite every way in which he acts to the contrary, he’s pretty sure that Leakee feels the same. Or, will tolerate him, at least, complaining the whole way, which is good enough, or better, even. Wouldn’t want to make anything too easy. That would suck all the fun, all the challenge, out of it.

 

Leakee still hasn’t said anything, and his silence is rubbing Mox in all the wrong ways. It’s rough, combined with the ambient noise around them, with his glower not fading in strength, sandpaper over his skin. Mox resists the urge to rub his chest.

 

"Look, I feel, you know, really bad about it, princess. So either you can sit here and pout about it all night, determined to have no fun whatsoever, or you could let me make it up to you." Punctuates it with a drag of his eyes up the entire length of Leakee’s body, a lick of his lips to top it off.

 

He swears, he fucking swears for a moment that Leakee is going to walk, middle fingers in the air—maybe not, seems too overblown, for him—and say fuck the necklace, fuck Mox, fuck his friend and the wrestling and championship, just wash his hands of the entire situation. He watches Mox like it’s the foremost thought in his mind, eyes narrowed and lips curled in disgust once the term of endearment is uttered.

 

“I think this counts as blackmail in most of the contiguous United States.”

 

The words pull a laugh out of Mox that surprises him nearly as much as it does Leakee, who blinks back at him like he’s never seen amusement on a human face before. He probably spends so much time in the mirror, pretty boy as he is, that he wouldn’t know what it looks like.

 

He runs a hand through his hair, ruffles it before smoothing back pieces that fell forward. “’S only blackmail if you go along with it.” If Leakee wants to call it blackmail, if that’s what helps him sleep at night, if he’ll jump into bed with Mox if he gets to put an excuse and a fancy name to it, Mox will play along. It’s like treating yourself to a seven-course meal that you’ll never pay for again, only to stroll past the same restaurant years down the road and find they’re serving free dinner that night. It’s lucky coincidence, pure and simple pleasure, and one more time won’t hurt anything but his waistline. Or, his ass, in this case.

 

He stands up from the chair, lengthens his back and reaches for the ceiling, hissing as something in his arm pops. Leakee’s eyes track every movement, and Mox turns his face away to hide his knowing smirk against the opposite shoulder.

 

“So? You buying what I’m selling?” he asks, after he’s managed to straighten his face. Leakee looks an awful lot like he’s bracing himself, staring up at him, and Mox thinks the taste of victory is so, so sweet. It’s just easy enough to still be fun, promising enough to put in effort.

 

“Better come with a receipt.” He stands, too, pulls himself to full height, and Mox takes a closer look, because there are a lot of things about Leakee that his memory hasn’t done justice. His arms, obviously, are a big selling point, the tattoo on his shoulder just looks so fucking cool, and the way the tank top clings to his thick waist, in comparison with the way Mox’s jeans are falling off his own, lights a spark in the base of his skull. Then there’s his face, which Mox has been watching the whole time, but, he’s reminded that it’s, you know, a pretty fucking nice face. Not in a _kind_ way, but, in the kind of way that counts. The kind of way that makes Mox want to see those lips wrapped around his cock again.

 

He tilts his head to the side in a motion designed to get Leakee to follow him, and they fall into step together. “Excuse you, asshole, I leave no unsatisfied customers. As you fucking well know.” Exiting the gym into the late afternoon sunlight is a brighter shock than Mox expects it to be. He’s squinting into the light, and when he glances over at Leakee, the dude has sunglasses on. Mox has no idea where he even pulled the things out of.

 

“What I know is that I could write everything about you off as a fluke. Probably will have to, after tonight.” He gives this sigh, one of those fake ass commiserating ones, all ‘I don’t want to have to do that, don’t make me do that’, when in reality, he’s fucking dying to. What Mox _is_ gonna make him do is eat every single word and ask for more. He stops next to the beat up coupe and sticks the key in the lock before Leakee catches up enough to ask, “You have a car?”

 

Mox completely resents the tone of disbelief in his voice. “Of fucking course I have a car,” he scowls. “It’s like an hour drive from Cincy, how else would I get here? I mean, it’s not, like, _my_ car, I borrowed it, but I have it now, right? Oh, and, look at that,” he says, as the door clicks and he opens it and slides in, reaching over to pop the latch on Leakee’s side like a fucking gentleman and everything, smiles sweetly up at him, “My locks work.”

 

Leakee’s mouth shuts before he starts whatever it was he was going to say, and his jaw pulls tight, like he’s grinding his teeth behind the apathetic expression, but he crawls into the passenger seat anyway. They’re both ridiculously large in the tiny car, closer together than they were sitting next to each other in the gym, long legs pulled back tighter than they should have to be. Mox has a sudden, violent desire to try and pull them both into the back seat, see if he could get Leakee off just by rubbing up against him, clothes on clothes, skin on skin, in the confined space.

 

Instead, he starts the car with a shake of his head and pulls out of the space, heading toward the place he has for the night. The room was supposed to be so he could drink tonight and have a place to crash, not worry about getting home til, like, tomorrow afternoon, but it serves an unexpectedly convenient purpose, now.

 

Leakee is being his usual, silent self, probably reflecting on every poor choice he’s made in his life that led him to this moment, and Mox hopes it’s such a long fucking list that it drives him to martyrdom for the sake of Mox getting off. Then again, the quiet makes for a poor travel companion, even for a ten minute drive.

 

“So, like, what’s with the sunglasses, man?” He glances over to confirm he’s got Leakee’s attention. “Are you under the impression that they make you look mysterious or cool? Because I’ll be the first to tell you, that’s not the case.”

 

To his surprise, Leakee leans back in his chair, makes like he's checking him out. “It’s summer, and you’re wearing a Goodwill jacket that has — yeah, with your name spray painted on. In orange. I’m not about to take any fashion advice from you.”

 

Mox grabs the steering wheel just a little bit tighter, takes the turn faster than he needs to, just to watch Leakee slam against the window while he’s ready and braced for it. “It’s a statement, okay, fuck you.” In daylight, Leakee isn’t nearly boner inducing enough to get away with this. Well, that’s not actually true, but Mox is gonna have to start drawing lines somewhere, because he’s just really goddamn rude. As it is, he’s starting to smirk, and that’s just unacceptable. “So’s my wrestling, like your friend is gonna find out.”

 

Leakee hums at that, strokes his chin and purses his lips a little bit like he’s trying to decide if he should say what he wants to. It’s really fucking distracting, the way it’s drawing attention to them. Mox shifts in his seat uncomfortably, pushes down on the gas a little harder. “Brother. Rosey’s my brother.”

 

And, that—Mox doesn’t know why he didn’t consider that, but it’s completely unexpected despite being fairly obvious. For the first time, he’s—not intimidated, that’s not the right word, that’s not a feeling he has, but he knows, any person who’s followed wrestling remotely over the last twenty years knows what family Rosey comes from. They’re a fucking dynasty.

 

Mox has fucked a member of one of professional wrestling’s royal families. Not that it matters, but—something to add to the resume.

 

“So why aren’t you a wrestler?” he asks, genuinely curious, before he realizes that Leakee might be and he wouldn’t even know.

 

Leakee doesn’t answer for a solid minute, shifting in his seat, staring down at clenched hands, and Mox wishes he didn’t even ask, because it’s not a comfortable silence. He’s about to change the subject, chatter away again, when Leakee finally speaks up. “I like football. That’s something that has nothing to do with my family. When you’re bred for something, it just gets, like—you want to prove that it’s not the only thing you can do.”

 

Mox has no semblance of an idea of how to respond to that, and Leakee looks the closest to flustered he probably ever does, in a way that really isn’t getting Mox’s rocks off, so it’s a nice time for the motel to pop into view. Of course, when he pulls into the parking lot and takes the spot in front of his door, Leakee stares out at the building in front of him with a frown. “I’m going to get hepatitis before I even step foot in the door. They probably run a black market organ operation out of the office back room. Do you even watch movies? This is how people lose kidneys.” The last sentence is mumbled more to himself than anything, and Mox thinks his eyes may come loose in his head and spin back into his brain for a moment he rolls them so hard.

 

“Stop being a fucking prima donna, okay, this is a perfectly reputable establishment.” Kid is probably used to silver spoons and five-star establishments. He could do with a dose of reality. He’s dragging his feet as Mox heads to the door, muttering something about cards when Mox pulls out an actual silver key to unlock the front door, but his hesitance would be a lot more convincing if he didn’t follow right along into the room.

 

Once the door is closed, Mox wastes little time, dropping fluidly to his knees, Leakee’s back pressed up against the door. He settles his hands on Leakee’s upper thighs, runs them down and back up a few times before the situation seems to dawn on the other man.

 

“Uh, what, what are you doing?” Leakee asks, as if he doesn’t fucking know, but he sounds a little dazed and this is just child’s play, really.

 

“I’m showing you, y’know, how bad I feel. Are you saying you don’t want me to atone for my sins?” Mox frowns ever so slightly, fluttering his eyelashes as he glances up through them. At this level, it quickly becomes obvious that Leakee doesn’t mind all that much when Mox is mocking him, so long as he paints a pretty picture while doing it. He feels, though, like he’ll enjoy other things Mox can do with his mouth a lot more. He reaches for the button of Leakee’s jeans, undoes them singlehandedly while the other pushes them down his hips.

 

“Are you allergic to beds or something?” The guy’s trying really hard to be a smartass, it sounds like, but when his fingers skirt under the waistband of his underwear, Leakee nearly gasps, this quick little inhale through his nose. Mox doesn’t get on his knees for anyone, usually, but it feels like he’s soaring above Leakee right now, like Mox is the one with a hand on _his_ head, pushing him down.

 

Mox tries to shrug using only his face, and it’s a lot more difficult than he expected. “Didn’t want to wait,” he has to say, to get his point across, before pulling down the fabric under his hand enough so that Leakee’s cock is on full display in front of him.

 

It’s the closest he’s been to it, head on, as it were. Doesn’t disappoint. Mox licks at the indent below his hip bone, just to get a feel for what his skin tastes like. He pushes Leakee’s clothes down to the floor, rests his left hand against his thigh, nails digging in the way he knows he likes done to him, his right hand gripping Leakee before his tongue flicks out over the head of his dick.

 

Leakee’s hand is in his hair, tightening before he even gets started. It isn’t the best feeling in the world, but the stinging in his scalp helps keep him focused as he opens his mouth, brings it forward slowly to meet his hand. When Leakee makes a noise or shifts his hips a little, Mox stores the memory of whatever caused it away, to use again when he’s ready. He pulls off to catch his breath, once, opening his eyes to glance up and see just how well Leakee is taking all of this. His eyelashes are in the way again, but Leakee is watching him, and he’s as hard to read as always, but Mox thinks he looks a little bit wary and a little bit pissed and a lot into it, all the same.

 

“Look pretty comfortable down there,” he says, after Mox runs a hand across the crease between his hip and thigh, puts his mouth back on Leakee’s cock. “First peace and quiet I’ve gotten all night.” Mox gives a tiny scrape of teeth at that, bites back a bit, and the hand in his hair pulls roughly, dragging a moan out of him. His own dick is hard and heavy in his jeans, looking for friction, and every tug on his head fuels the building heat in his stomach.

 

It’s not a race, though Mox hates to take his time; it’s more a competition, a way to see how long it takes to pull the other man apart, and when he twists his wrist gripping the base slightly, tightens the suction, hollows his cheeks and lets Leakee slide further into his mouth, well, game over. He’s standing there, after, panting slightly, head tilted back to rest on the door behind him. “Shut you up, too, sounds like,” Mox gets out, up at him, voice raspy and lower than normal.

 

Leakee looks down at him, then, and it’s the first Mox has felt _below_ him since this began. He starts to get up, but Leakee grabs his shirt, yanks him up by it. Mox stumbles to his feet and Leakee pulls him in by his hips, bringing them flush against his still naked lower half, his cock finally feeling a little of what it’s been looking for. Honestly, he doesn’t usually care if he gets other people’s sweat on him—he’s a wrestler, after all—their come, whatever, it’s _fine_ , and it feels fucking _great_ , right now, but he wrinkles his nose at the contact anyway to be a contrary little shit. “You don’t like that, Mox? What’re you gonna do about it?”

 

There’s a lot to like about Leakee, Mox thinks, if he cared enough to try. There’s even more to despise—arrogance, entitlement, those stupid fucking glasses that are hopefully lost forever in the depths of this room—but this is one of the former. It’s cute, the way he thinks he’s in control, here, just because he’s seen how Mox looks staring up at him. Leakee can keep believing that, as far as he’s concerned, so long as Mox gets an orgasm out of it.

 

He laughs, because Leakee hasn’t seen half of what he can do, what he’s capable of, but Mox thinks he’d be willing to show him, if he had the chance. For now, he grabs his own fistful of hair and brings their mouths together, tongue darting out and stroking over Leakee’s. He wonders if Leakee can taste himself, hopes that he’s a little uncomfortable at the flavor of his own come.

 

The hands on his hips tighten before they force him back and he falls onto the bed. Leakee is always pushing him, it seems, in one way or another, and it’s completely unacceptable. Right now, though, it’s getting Mox really fucking hot. He shoves himself up the bed, spreading his legs invitingly, and laughs, quiet and throaty, when Leakee pulls his pants back up and lowers himself at his side instead of between them.

 

His jeans are somewhere down around his knees, next thing he realizes, and the way Leakee leans down and whispers, “Yeah, knew you wanted this bad,” right before he wraps his hand around Mox’s cock makes him want to thrust up and pull away simultaneously.

 

He’s had Leakee’s hand gripping him before, but it feels different, this way, when there’s less going on to distract from the sensations, when it’s just Leakee’s fist between the two of them. A few strokes in, and the world outside this room may as well be burning down around them. Mox thinks maybe it is already, he can feel the flames, the heat. When a thumb brushes over the head of his cock, he lets out a long, low moan, and Leakee laughs down at him. “I’ve told you you were easy, before, haven’t I?”

 

“Shut up,” Mox manages to get out, a little breathless, and it might be one of those things he’s heard of, like saying no when you really mean yes, because if Leakee listens to him maybe his face would stop burning but if Leakee stops talking Mox thinks he might spontaneously combust.

 

Good thing he never seems to do what Mox tells him. “You are,” that low voice continues, self-satisfied smirk dripping through the tone, hand never once faltering on his dick. Mox is fairly certain he’s dreamed this, before, or created a fantasy out of it. “Doesn’t make it any less fun to take you apart.” Leakee hums a little—it seems to echo in the room. “You don’t look like a screamer, but I bet if anyone could make you, I could. You would, for me.”

 

Mox doesn’t know how he can say this shit after having a mouth around his cock, because the sparks shooting in his brain from the combination of physical sensation and undisguised condescendment has him wondering if he’ll be able to walk, later, let alone have a match.

 

Immediately after he has that thought, there’s a moment, a split second, where his blood runs cold, because _no_ , he wasn’t expecting _this_ , but, well, there’s no reason for Leakee not to, is there. He almost begrudgingly respects the method, if that’s what this is. And he’s here, anyway, nearly fucking floating, so he can wait a little bit longer to bring out his teeth.

 

“Bet you’ve thought about this, haven’t you? The way you strolled right up to me today, stretching out your body like it’s enough of a temptation to get me to go along.”

 

“Obviously worked,” Mox grits out, thrusting up into the hand around him. He’s so fucking close it’s unreal, and Leakee seems to _know_ , slowing down at just the right points to edge him. It’s infuriating enough that he reaches down to wrap his hand over Leakee’s, but it’s just beaten away, and he growls in frustration.

 

“See, what you don’t understand, is that you have no say. You think you’re in control here, that this is your house, but it’s my world, baby, everyone else just lives in it.” Leakee speeds up his strokes again, and Mox is so angry he could die. It makes everything white out around him, blinded with it. He comes violently, his body tremoring, lashing a fist out at Leakee to catch him on the shoulder.

 

“Think you’ll remember _that_ ,” Leakee says, crawls back off the bed, smirk firmly in place, while Mox lays there, panting. He’s sweating, still in his jacket, and there are white stripes ruining his t-shirt underneath. That’s the least of his worries now, though, under Leakee’s gaze.

 

“You bastard, you complete fucking cocksucker.” It lacks a lot of the fire it should have, because he’s livid but he’s also impressed, the lengths to which Leakee would go to distract him, get back at him. It’s commitment, reeks a little of obsession, and somehow makes Mox feel a little less played.

 

“Think we’ve established that’s more your domain.” Leakee roots around on the floor, comes back up with the shades, which he places on top of his head. “Oh, by the way, you have a match to get to. Should probably head back.” He’s a little in awe of the balls Leakee has, saying that so casually. It’s amazing, and he might actually appreciate it if he wasn’t so incensed over the fact that Leakee thinks it’s that easy to put him off his game, to get in his head.

 

Mox tucks himself back into his pants, sits up with his elbows supporting him. “Yeah, about that. About that.”

 

“What?” Leakee scowls a bit at him. Mox isn’t satisfied that the smugness has not yet been scrubbed from his face, but he’s not done yet.

 

"I know you think you’re being real manipulative, here,” he says, scratching at his stomach, letting his face muscles remember how to form a grin, “but what do you think it says that I have a match against your brother in an hour, and you chose to be here with me? What will he think when he sees us walk in together, wrinkled clothes and all?"

 

A shadow passes over Leakee’s face, but quick enough a smile is pulling at the corner of his lips, like the thought really doesn’t bother him. "Fuck off."

 

"Hope you cheer for me just as loudly in the ring as you do in bed, babe." Mox gets up from the bed, opens the pocket of his bag and pulls out the necklace stuffed in there. He tosses it to Leakee with a flick of his wrist that looks much smoother than he feels. He definitely doesn’t pay attention _at all_ to the way his legs feel a little like jello underneath him. “Here. Outlived its usefulness, I think.”

 

Leakee just glares, with a look that says he has no interest in knowing. And that’s perfectly fine, because Mox has kind of lost his interest in talking. They drive back together (mostly because Leakee got in the car before he could take off without him) in the most awkward kind of silence, Leakee self-assured that he’s gotten one over on Mox, and Mox getting more and more determined by the minute to prove him wrong.

  
They don’t see Rosey when they enter, but it’s all the same. He wins the match, retains his title just like he said he would. While they're announcing his name and everyone is busy cheering him, Mox climbs up on the ropes, belt over his shoulder, towering high above the seats, and blows a kiss to Leakee, who’s nodding his head silently, solemnly, conceding his loss, in the second row. Yeah, victory is pretty fucking sweet.


	3. i don't want you on my mind

 

That should have been the end of it. If there is, somewhere out in the greater universe, a god, Mox is certain that they would want him to have these wins over Leakee, to wash his hands of everything to do with him and repent his wayward, college douchebag cocksucking ways, and thus wouldn’t put temptation in his way, once again, even though he’s completely more than strong enough to resist it. That being said, he’s not really much of a believer in anything, and while he doubts he’ll ever get in a compromising situation with the guy again, he doesn’t see what harm it would do to keep the more pleasant memories at the ready.

 

Besides, despite his best efforts, Mox has been having trouble getting off recently without a condescending voice to inch him closer, so he has more than enough of Leakee in his brain to last the rest of his fucking lifetime.

 

Of course, it’s not too much later at all that Rosey comes back, seeking a rematch, a smirking Leakee in tow, and Mox spots him immediately from across the building and thinks, this is the reason atheists exist.

 

That’s something that Leakee deserves to know. Mox makes it a point to tell him, when he has the unfortunate luck of speaking to him again.

 

It’s easy enough to brush off Rosey’s request, not least of which because the initial match was such a joke to begin with. He’s not going to hand a rematch to someone who hasn’t earned it, doesn’t remotely deserve it. Leakee, however, is not so easily deterred. Mox tries really hard to ignore him, he really fucking does, but there are eyes boring into him no matter which way he turns. It’s annoying, but Mox can’t help the deep sense of satisfaction that seeps into every inch of his body at the unsolicited attention—to call it unwelcome would be stretching the truth beyond its breaking point. There is a certain kind of gratification that comes from the weight of Leakee’s gaze following him, the kind that makes Moxley’s lips stretch into a smirk that’s at least half grimace. He doesn’t even have to try, and that’s disappointing, but he takes comfort in his assumption that it’s at least twice as painful for Leakee, being wrapped up in Mox, that he’s in his head and Leakee can’t hide it.

 

But when he finally faces him enough that their eyes meet, and Leakee crooks a finger as if Mox is at his beck and call, like a fucking lap dog, he is just so disgusted that he can’t _not_ say something.

 

A match is still going on when he storms over, gets right up in Leakee’s space. It’s not the easiest thing to be intimidating in front of someone who’s seen you naked, especially considering Leakee’s a bit bigger than him, overall, but Mox likes to think he’s got the whole blocking the light out thing down well enough. He's got Leakee crowded up against the wall, staring back at him, looking more amused than anything with just the look in his eyes—Mox wonders if that’s the deal with those god awful shades, that they cover up the only tell Leakee seems to have, as far as he can see—and the need to provoke more of a reaction flares in his stomach. He doesn’t really have anything prepared, though, and what ends up coming out of his mouth is, “Are you aware you’re the fucking reason that atheists exist?”

 

“Your greetings are always so memorable,” Leakee grins at him, little creased lines forming around his eyes, and Mox feels a little sick, something sinking in him. “What does that even mean?”

 

He had thought that Leakee was pretty insufferable, before, but if this is really him when he thinks he’s winning, then Mox is going to do everything in his power to make sure that never fucking happens. “It means the sight of your face shatters hopes and dreams everywhere. Probably—” he draws the end of the word out, voice high and sing-song, leaning in closer to Leakee even than the volume and lighting calls for, “probably even your brother’s, I mean, don’t you have any other fucking thing to do than follow him around just for a glance at my pretty face?”

 

“The only hopes my looks are destroying are ones of matching mine,” he answers, eyebrow raised, ignoring the rest of Mox’s claim. Mox wonders if it took practice to shove that much arrogance into one sentence, or if it’s something Leakee was born with—it’s impressive, either way, and he’s growing increasingly sick of finding things to credit to Leakee when he doesn’t _like_ the guy. He must show some sign of deliberation on his face, because Leakee continues, “Don’t act like you’re not aware. You’re the one who’s compared me to statues, before.

 

He snorts softly, clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth just for the sound. “For the similarly unmoving, stony resemblance, yeah.” Mox taps the fingers of his right hand, resting next to Leakee’s shoulder, against the wall. He wants to make this night more exciting, wants something to spark. “Speaking of, you’re being a little bit of a killjoy, here, kind of boring. I was expecting a little more when I came over.” He turns away, starts to go, but then Leakee is grabbing him by the arm and pulling him toward the door.

 

“Get your ass out here, come on.”

 

“Why? You gonna spank me?” There’s something ridiculous about the question, something that forces this high-pitched cackle out of his throat, because he’s not sure he’d be entirely opposed to the idea, all things considered, but he doubts that’s what the other man has in mind, anyway. Leakee just expects him to follow along into the hallway, and Mox does, but certainly not for that reason. “Because I’ve got news for you, sunshine. You’re old news, I’ve had you before. What gives you the idea that I’d want you again?”

 

Leakee takes a second before answering. He always gives off the impression that he’s thinking very hard before each move he makes, when, if pressed, he’d almost assuredly say that he’s not thinking at all, when it comes to Mox. Moxley loves a good contradiction, loves to sink his teeth in and tear it to pieces, along with whoever it’s attached to. He’s nearly gleeful over it, but tries to carefully school his expression—he’s got a _good_ poker face, for the most part, but amusement is always a little harder to hide, moreso when it’s answered with Leakee’s particular blend of simmering temper and undisguised disdain. And maybe he looks too smug, or something, maybe a bit more disinterested in the proceedings than he is, but whatever conclusion Leakee comes to, he grabs Moxley’s face, brings their lips together harshly.

 

They’ve kissed before, but this one’s different. It’s hard and rough but it’s not immediately _leading_ anywhere, because in spite of his constant disregard for the mundane rules of decency, Mox is not going to jump Leakee’s bones in the fucking arena hallway and even he must realize it. His hands are buzzing with electric energy and he doesn’t know what to do with it if they’re not stripping off clothes and groping for skin. It’s like being caught in a tornado, everything blowing away around him, that it’s all Mox can do to grab hold of the nearest solid item and hang on for dear life, but that’s Leakee, too. After a few seconds, he’s able to give as good as he gets, pressing back into it, before a stinging splits his lip open and they’re both tasting blood.

 

Leakee pulls back to survey his handiwork, the slightest smirk tugging on his face as his eyes track the cut on Moxley’s mouth. “Yeah, you still want me.”

 

And with five words, Mox is back to feeling that annoyance that underlies every interaction they’ve ever had, because this prick has to kill his buzz every single time. “No, I’m over it, I think. I clearly am over it. You didn’t cheer for me when you were here last time, and I don’t need to fuck around with anyone who’s not willing to be my loyal supporter. Not when I have so many.”

 

The look on Leakee’s face displays his obvious disbelief, but he plays along with the words. “You didn’t really expect that. Everyone else there was, anyway. You hardly needed me to.”

 

 _Yeah, but I wanted you to_. He shoves the thought away as quickly as he can, before he says it out loud or some shit. Leakee would completely take it the wrong way, run wild with it as some proof that Mox is, like, into him or something. That he actually is upset about Leakee not clapping for him, when really, he just wants to break Leakee down. Make him feel something for Mox that isn’t returned, payback for acting so aloof when he just wants to screw.

 

He’s still standing way too close, but it doesn’t feel as defiant now, just unnecessary and unentertaining. Mox takes a couple steps back as the doors open, the few people there pouring out, and it’s just enough of a crowd that he can get away in it. He takes a moment out of his escape to call over his shoulder, “You know, three’s a pattern. Might want to back off a little, pal. I might get the wrong impression or something.” He doesn’t wait to see Leakee’s reaction, but the picture in his mind is delicious, feeds into whatever is unsettled in his stomach.

 

He's on his way back to the locker room to grab his stuff when he's blindsided, nearly fucking tackled into the bathroom behind him by two hundred seventy pounds of muscle and silky hair, pinning him against the wall. Leakee flips the lock on the door, slides the lever counterclockwise until it clicks into place, and Mox watches him do it, watches the slide of his fingers against the metal, slow and steady for just a moment, like time is standing still for this one eternal second. Locks are a theme, with them, a pattern that he wants to smash apart, their orderly arrangements a mockery to everything he stands for.

 

That part of his mind, the one that gets stuck in those cycles, shuts off as soon as Leakee’s pressed up against him once more, grabbing a fist full of t-shirt to tug it down and tearing his teeth into the revealed flesh connecting his neck to his shoulder. It’s hard, pulls a rough grunt out of Moxley, right before a second bite is placed right next to it and his trunks are shoved down around his thighs, far short of the grimy tiles of dubious cleanliness that make up the floor. His body’s only starting to catch up to his brain, his cock just starting to harden, but Leakee doesn’t seem disheartened by it, just licks his palm, grabs hold, and starts pumping him, fast.

 

“Could have left it unlocked, y’know,” Mox forces the words out around a hiss, has trouble with how tightly his teeth are grit together. The hand on him is punishing, unrelenting. It doesn’t feel bad, really, after he’s up to speed, but it’s not _good_ , either—nearly too fast, too rough, sending little shocks of pain up through his body and making his arms jerk, a little. “Nothing anyone out there hasn’t seen.”

 

There’s a low, unamused chuckle, then, breath hitting the sensitive area of his neck just below his jaw, relaxed and completely at odds with the frantic pace of Leakee’s movements. “You’ve spent enough time getting off on your own lewd behavior,” he says, as if that’s something he would fucking know or get to decide. The hand that isn’t speeding over his dick threads into Mox’s hair, using it as leverage to jerk his head to the side. “I’m not here to enable your exhibitionism.”

 

Mox is not sure why he’s here at all, really, except apparently to get off, and maybe he needs Mox to do it because god knows there’s not another person in the world who would put up with all Leakee’s shit, and even he’s doing it grudgingly, and mostly because it’s so amusing to see Leakee attempt to stomach him. “What are you good for, then? Cuz this is the worst fucking handjob I’ve ever gotten.” Which isn’t the truth—there are a lot of people who think they know how to handle a cock, but even Mox has fucking expectations—but it’s a close thing even though it isn’t, the way he can’t even keep his eyes open, the way it hurts even through the pleasure.

 

“You walked away from me twice tonight when I wasn’t done talking,” Leakee says, voice as calm as anything, like he’s talking about the weather or the fucking state of the union and his body isn’t pressed all up against Mox, his hand isn’t wrapped around his cock. “I don’t like that shit.” So it _is_ a punishment. Mox feels his tongue poke out of the side of his mouth, bites down hard on it in an attempt to stop the smirk from forming. Those sparks of pain are starting to flare in a satisfying flash up his groin and into his abs, making his legs shake as they struggle to support him, a little.

 

“F'you wanted to chastise me, might be other ways to do it that’re a little less fucking gay.” Air is getting away from him, a little, and the longer this goes on the better it feels. He wonders how long he can hold out, how much time could pass before Leakee loses feeling in his arm and gives up in disgust. How long Mox would have to wait to outlast him. He runs his tongue over chapped lips, imagines pushing Leakee to his knees after he finally concedes and finishing himself off, marking up his face, because he could wash that shit off, but Mox would always know it was there, and more importantly, Leakee would too.

 

He moans loudly at the thought, and Leakee's hand twitches on his hip like it's itching to slap itself over his big mouth. “I’ve got your attention, though, don’t I?” he asks, and fuck, Leakee twists his wrist just a little, speaking his language like he's known it all along, and maybe he has, maybe he's been feigning ignorance this entire time, because right now he's acting as if he speaks Mox like a native tongue. Mox can spot bullshit from a mile away, and this, this doesn't feel like that. It sounds conniving and a touch menacing, but not necessarily insincere. Not like Leakee didn’t want his attention in the first place.

 

He has no idea what to do with that, so Mox settles on mockingly playing it off. “Think that’s an accomplishment? Think all the pretty boys don’t turn my head?”

 

The hand that had been idly tracing across various parts of Moxley’s body, the one not currently attempting to light his fucking blood vessels on fire through his dick, grabs his chin and forces his face toward Leakee’s. Mox blinks lazily, taking in his expression. He has really long eyelashes, Mox notices, when he blinks back. “Bet _they_ don’t _keep_ your eyes on them.”

 

Mox lets his mouth drop open to retort, but all that comes out is laughter, louder and more full bodied than he would have expected. His entire body feels simultaneously heavy and charged, toes curling in the tips of his boots and fingers grasping and sliding against the wall because they refuse to find a hold in Leakee's shirt.

 

Mox comes into Leakee's cupped fist, teeth snapping at his other hand as it releases his chin. It’s one of the best fucking orgasms he’s ever had. Thinks he actually might hate Leakee for being the one to give it to him, for being so fucking perfect if he just closes his goddamn mouth.

 

Leakee reaches around him, rinses his hand off in the sink “Oh, by the way,” Leakee starts, which is not usually a good thing, in Mox's vast experience, those words, or his talking, in general. “They gave my brother a match against your friend. What’s his name? Pepper?” If Mox hadn't seen the way his mouth twisted around the word himself, he would never have believed it was possible for Leakee to sound any more disgusted than he normally does around him. He's a little offended, frankly. Thought they had something special, this mutual disdain. “Next week. Looks like you’ll be seeing me real soon.” Then he does the weirdest thing. He's smirking again when he tucks a loose, sweaty strand of Mox's hair back behind his ear, his thumb just brushing the edge of his cheekbone, like that's something they would do, like they're those kind of people.

 

Leakee, as hard as it is to imagine, might be, when he's with anyone else. Mox, however, is definitely not that kind of person. He jerks away from the touch, swinging a hand to push Leakee, and Leakee goes with it, drops back, looking deeply amused.

 

“I wouldn’t count on it, sweetheart!” Mox sings after him as he retreats, mostly so Leakee's words aren't the last ones hanging in the otherwise empty bathroom. He's the champion, where else is he going to be but here, waiting for a match, and Leakee knows it. What's really bothering him, more than it probably should, the way everything about Leakee does, is that he's not sure who was victorious, this round. Mox feels like he took a lot more hits than he managed to deliver, tonight, without stepping foot inside the ring.

 

The one saving grace, now, is that he is the only one of them experiencing the after effects of a pretty nice orgasm. _That_ part doesn't feel too much like losing, at least.

 

\---

 

Mox conveniently arranges for there to be an open spot on commentary during the main event the following week, one that he will be more than happy to waltz in and fill. Simple enough, really—just a combination of intimidation and sending The Crew in to do the dirty work. Serves several purposes, too, not the least of which is guaranteeing that there is no possible way Leakee can approach him, first, so any interaction between the two of them will be strictly on Mox’s terms. Just the way he likes it.

 

He catches himself smiling at the thought in the mirror before he wipes it away, scrubs his hands over his eyes and puts his game face on. Pepper is ready to go by the time Mox makes his way to ringside, walking right past the seat Leakee is sitting in and not sparing it a glance. Not yet. He wants to wait, wait and see the look on his face after the match. Mox was unprepared, last time, but he’s had an entire week to plan this out and, while it’s still not much more than organized chaos, a flurry of ideas floating around in his brain, there’s a general path to follow. He wants to see what works, what reactions he gets when he slams all the different buttons.

 

He’s still not looking when he pushes aside one of the other announcers, slides into the broadcast booth to take a mic. There are some water bottles behind the table, so Mox grabs one and opens it, makes a show of drinking it slowly. Just in case, you know, there’s an extra set of eyes on him. He’s going to do his damndest to upset Leakee, tonight, and it’s going to be _fascinating_ , because the guy is a fucking enigma, a puzzle that Mox hasn’t tired of, yet, but he doesn’t just want him angry over those actions that are yet to come. He wants Leakee furious over all the things that he brings out of the other man. Which is a feeling that Moxley has become far too familiar with for comfort.

 

Rosey comes out, then, to this absolutely terrible as shit music, lots of horn blaring sounds, and he’s calling himself Kimo now and wearing some horrific Hawaiian shirt because he’s nothing but the caricature of a joke Mox exposed him for when they faced each other. Pepper jumps on him before the bell, laying in immediately, and Mox lets out a shout of delight amidst all the words running out of his mouth.

 

It’s easier, from that point, once he can concentrate on the action, to remember that he cares about things happening in this room besides the guy sitting on the other side of it, but he can’t quite forget about him, either. It’s annoying, constantly trying to bat those thoughts aside, especially when Kimo-Rosey-Wrestler Wannabe leans over the rope after a particularly hard tackle to Pepper, pointing to him and yelling, “You know what that feels like, you’re gonna feel that, jackass!”, and Mox finds himself nearly daydreaming about a different angry Samoan telling him he’s gonna feel it in another setting before he even thinks to take insult.

 

He redoubles his efforts to get into the match, after that, marveling a little at the dropkicks Pepper makes look so effortless, though his offense is doing nothing to wear down the large man he’s in the ring with. This match is all Rosey, and Mox gets more and more worked up about it—in a backwards way, in a way that squirms under his skin, it’s like losing to Leakee all over again. The end comes too quickly, when Rosey has Pepper up for a modified piledriver, and when he hits it, the yell of “Dear God in heaven why is this happening to us?” is ripped from his throat, because it fucking _feels_ like it’s happening to him, too. It’s felt that way for the last week.

 

Moxley takes a second to pull himself the fuck together after the match ends, hands on his head to curb the sensation that it might actually explode, before he rushes into the ring and starts beating down Rosey, Sami close behind to back him up. They’re assaulting him with heavy blows, kicks to the side, but somehow Rosey still powers to his feet, throws them both back and to the ground before butting their heads together. Mox stumbles back, falling over the top rope, and while his vision swims for a few brief seconds, he manages to get himself to a chair outside the room and slumps into it, eyes closed.

 

“Jesus Christ, my head really is going to fucking explode, shit,” he mutters to himself, letting out a hiss as he touches his forehead, which is probably really fucking bruised and is definitely really fucking tender.

 

“Nothing you don’t deserve,” a sharp-smooth voice reaches him, and Mox hisses again because this is the exact situation he was trying to avoid, tonight. It’s really fucking unfortunate, the way things turned out. He wonders if he can have a redo—if he screws his eyes shut tight enough, maybe Leakee will disappear, reveal himself to be a figment of his injured brain and teleport far away to where Mox can approach him when he’s more prepared. He opens his eyes quickly, like ripping off a bandaid, and blinks up at the man in question. No such luck, obviously. “What point were you trying to prove, exactly?”

 

Mox stares for longer than he’s comfortable with, eyes squinted to dull the light and stop his head from pounding. Sure, he’s still trying to feel some things about Leakee out, but he means it when he says they know each other. They’re nothing, sure, less than nothing—despite the frequency with which they’ve met, recently, _they_ aren’t anything substantial, as significant to each other as dreams—but Moxley’s still disappointed that Leakee has to ask.

 

“Don’t you get it yet, there is no point, don’t you understand?” There is, but there isn’t, because Leakee is right here, scowl growing by the second, but he won’t be tomorrow. They exist outside of each others’ orbits, and none of this fucking matters, there are countless other people he can do this to. The point is that there is no point. It’s just fun. “You think you can stop me? Think anyone out there can?” He’s up and out of the chair, getting in Leakee’s face, as close as he dares without touching. “There ain’t no one to tell me I can’t. That’s the point.

 

“Tell me I’m lying,” Mox demands, moving ever closer and finally creating contact between them, nibbling at Leakee’s earlobe before licking a stripe just underneath it. “Tell me I’m wrong. I’m going to fuck you tonight, princess, fucking tell me I’m wrong.”

 

The thing of it is, he almost wants it. Almost wants to be stopped in his tracks and pushed, back to the wall, because it’s been a long time since someone’s made him lash out like a cornered animal. Mox wants that fire, that violence. It’s just, he has a warm, willing body pressed up against him, and, right now, he wants that a lot more.

 

Though, if he keeps pushing, maybe, just maybe, he could have both.

 

“You’re disgusting,” Leakee tries, the shake of his body under Moxley’s mouth absent in his voice, but he can feel it under his lips, still, as he drags them slowly across the pulse point to the side of Leakee’s throat, forming a secret smile. “Get your tongue off me. You probably have a concussion or something, anyway. You’d be a terrible lay.”

 

“Think I can see straight enough to get my cock in a hole,” he mumbles, speaking into the side of Leakee’s neck until he pulls back to look him in the eye again. “I fuck like a champion when I’m shitfaced, this could only be better than that.”

 

He doesn’t look persuaded, Leakee, or maybe he’s already been convinced this whole time, because the fight he puts up next is pretty fucking weak. “And how exactly would I ditch my brother for that long? Not like I’m going to let him pick me up and see who I’ve been with.”

 

That stings, a little, like cuts on the corners of his mouth, like acid sliding down his throat. It shouldn’t, because it’s what every fucking person says about him, once they know, and in a town like this everybody knows. Leakee, clearly, knows. Mox swipes his tongue over his lips to clear the bitter taste away, smiles in a way that feels more like gnashing teeth than anything else, and he can’t stand still now, stepping one foot forward and then the other, but not managing to travel anywhere. “Not like he knows who lives at my place. I’ll behave myself, scouts honor.”

 

“I sincerely doubt you were ever a boy scout.” Leakee’s eyes travel over his body in a manner that’s a lot less dismissive than it usually is, but it doesn’t soothe Moxley’s smarting pride.

 

“My childhood affiliations are not what’s in question, here, Jesus Christ,” because of course that’s the only part of Mox’s statement he’d address, the dickbag. He steps a few paces away, leans against the doorway that leads outside. A cigarette finds its way into his hand, and he lights it as Leakee stands there, watching him. “I’m driving you to my place, and we both know it.” _Tell me I’m wrong_ , he nearly says again, and this time, it might be more important than the sex.

 

“No,” Leakee says, “you’re not,” and Moxley grins, readies himself for a fight.

 

“Aren’t I?” he asks, and Leakee closes the gap between them again, eyeing the smoke floating around him with disapproval. He reaches to take the cigarette from Mox, but as he’s in all likelihood looking not to take a drag of his own but to extinguish and waste fifty cents of the twenty bucks Mox pocketed tonight because he’s an unsympathetic asshole to the plights of the common people, he dances it out of Leakee’s grasp.

 

“No,” Leakee confirms, and Mox stretches up to his full height, claws at the ready, before he continues, “you aren’t going to crash us into a lamp post with your damn head injury. Give me your keys.” Moxley laughs, expelling a cloud of smoke. This is better and worse than what he expected, but he’ll take it, under one condition.

 

“There is no fucking way you are driving that car anywhere,” he spins on one foot and heads out the exit, head lolling back to grin at Leakee over his shoulder. “Does your silver spoon fed ass even have a license or does your chauffeur do all the work?”

 

For all of Leakee’s complaints of the trip here being attempted murder, he certainly doesn’t seem concerned with the force with which Moxley’s head hits the wall. After they’d stumbled through the unlocked door—pulling Leakee into a heated, open-mouthed kiss before he noticed, to help disguise the truth of there being nothing to steal—they found themselves up against a hard surface again, and this time it’s Mox pushing Leakee down onto a bed, straddling him, arms pinned above his head.

 

Leakee fights back before relaxing into his ministrations, though that’s abso-fucking-lutely not the last of him being a shit, Mox is sure. He runs his teeth along Leakee’s neck, giving a small nip, before huffing in the scent that hangs around him there. “You smell good, you fucking smell so good,” like spice and sweat and the hint of something vaguely sweet, and the acrid curl of smoke mixed in makes it all the better, like Mox has left a mark, there, that he’s corrupted something that wasn’t pure but wasn’t to be tampered with, either.

 

“Wish I could say the same,” Leakee gripes, wrinkling his nose as Mox goes in for another kiss, ash and tar on his breath. He grins into it, presses his tongue into Leakee’s mouth and thinks the aborted noise of disgust is the best thing he’s ever heard before it trails off into a moan.

 

He strips himself down and then Leakee, pulling his boxers off and licking his lips at the sight. Leakee watches him with narrowed eyes. “Come on, Moxley,” he says, pushing his hips up off the bed. “Put that pretty mouth to good use.”

 

“My mouth isn’t fucking pretty,” Mox snaps—sort of an automatic response, though, because mostly he’s gloating over the fact that Leakee is still thinking about how good Mox sucked him off, which lessens the bite that he still thinks about the first time they met, how he’s dying to know if Leakee gets fucked as well as he fucked Mox.

 

He doesn’t use his mouth for that, but he does reach over and grab his lube off of the box next to the bed, holds the cap of the open bottle between his teeth. He’s pouring it over his fingers and Leakee’s watching him the whole time, silently, until it’s time to get started and Mox can practically taste tight heat wrapped around his cock and he asks, “Are you ever going to get on with it?”

 

Mox nearly resists the urge to slap him on the face a few times, but there’s no real reason not to, and it’s too appealing to pass up. Leakee scowls up at him, but Mox smiles serenely back. “Y’know me, be prepared’s my motto,” he says, holding up three fingers and wiggling them with a grin, and Leakee rolls his eyes and mutters something about corrupted childhood memories or some shit that Mox couldn’t care less about. He slides a finger into Leakee, then thinks better of it and goes straight for two, biting his lip at the way all the air hisses out of Leakee’s lungs. God, this is gonna be so good, he knows it. “That what you were lookin’ for, sunshine?”

 

Leakee tries to kick at him, but Mox just laughs and continues opening him up, adding that third finger when Leakee swears and calls him a bastard, because he is, but Leakee doesn’t know the half of it. “This is gonna be the best fuck you’ve ever had,” Moxley informs him, because if he can’t exorcise the guy from his dick even when he’s not around, he’s gonna make damn sure he sticks with Leakee from now on, too. “Gonna feel me every move you make, tomorrow.”

 

“Full of hot air,” Leakee grits out, so Mox leans down to kiss him, exhaling into his mouth until Leakee’s gasping for air, and the very last of his breath is punched out when Mox pushes in.

 

Holy shit, holy fucking _shit_ , the warm pressure is so tight around him that Mox can’t help but let out a hum, mad that it drowns out the sound of Leakee choking underneath him. Leakee slides a hand around his shoulder, meant to keep him from pulling away, and Mox groans, then, shaking with the effort it takes to hold still. “You’re gonna kill me. If I don’t move soon, I’m gonna die with my cock in your ass.”

 

“Please,” Leakee breathes out, so shaky that at first Mox nearly mistakes it for a plea, wonders just how often he’s bottomed, before, because he’s making it sound more and more like a rare thing, “what better death could you think up?”

 

“Can you ever just,” Mox sighs heavily, reaching and resting a hand on Leakee’s wrists where they’re still resting above his head, presses his fingers in sharply. “Do you have to fucking respond to everything? Shut up, just shut your mouth and let me enjoy this, stop talking, it makes my dick soft.”

 

Leakee laughs at that, this sharp peal of sound that forces all the air out of his lungs again. Mox takes it as an invitation, starts to rock his hips, thrusting experimentally a few times before settling into a rhythm that isn’t meant to ease Leakee into it. He is, miraculously enough, not complaining, though, just rolls his hips a few times to match each push forward, and then he does _something_ , something with his muscles that just squeezes Mox perfectly, and Mox lets out a groan and falters for a second, fighting not to bust a nut right then and there, because _fucking hell_ that was amazing. “Feels like it,” Leakee says, that dry laughter still in his voice, because he’s a smug asshole.

 

“You’re so fucking smug,” Moxley informs him, in case he hasn’t realized, because he’s having a little trouble stopping his thoughts from just spilling out of his mouth, right now. “Just wait, just wait, I’ll rip you to pieces, I’m going to tear. You. Apart.” He punctuates the last words with deep, rough thrusts, his fingers tightening around Leakee’s wrists. He’ll have to wear long sleeves, bracelets, a jacket for awhile if he wants to hide the bruises, and Mox grins at him, doesn’t feel the need to let him in on the secret.

 

“Let go,” Leakee demands, pulls his arms out of Moxley’s grip, who barely keeps himself upright. He understands what’s going on in Mox’s head _too_ well, sometimes, for all the time they haven’t spent together, and Moxley laughs because he told Leakee, he told them they knew each other.

 

When he feels himself getting close, Mox wraps a hand around Leakee, strokes him as fast as he dares, because he’s not going to be the one to let go first, not this time. He leans as close as he can to Leakee without letting their faces touch, remind him of just who he’s here with, just what he’s not allowed to forget. Leakee is trying really hard not to make any noise, anything other than his breathing into Mox’s mouth, and Moxley wishes he had smoke in his lungs, that he could blow it into Leakee’s, mark him from the inside, too, where he can’t ever get rid of it.

 

They come like that, Leakee first, wet spilling into the space between them, and then Mox, smiling through it at his victory, again, because in the end that’s the only feeling that matters, that he came out on top, tonight, in more ways than one.

 

As soon as Leakee catches his breath he’s pushing Mox away, leaning over and fishing his phone out of his pocket, and Mox sets to cleaning himself up. After a quick discussion where he has to obviously smooth over things with his brother—“Got distracted by a honey, you know how it is,” he says, and Mox laughs so loud that Leakee shoves him off the bed—he’s glaring at Moxley, who still can’t wipe the grin off his face.

 

“You hate me.”

 

“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re not important enough to hate.” Mox grits his teeth and tries not to seethe, because he was having a good night, all things considered, til now.

 

“Well, god damn, you’re high maintenance. What do you want from me?”

 

Leakee just raises an eyebrow as answer, sets the phone down and gets to rounding up all his clothes, and two minutes later they’re back on his body rather than painting a telling picture all over Mox’s floor. The sound of a running motor is buzzing outside his front door, and Mox makes a show of pulling on some clothing, walking Leakee to it.

 

Leakee looks torn between saying something and not, and if he could look like that more, just err on the silent side a bit more often, Mox would be pleased. He saves him the deliberation by licking his lips and leaning in,pressing a wet, sloppy kiss to Leakee’s cheek. Whatever he was trying not to say is lost, and instead, when Moxley pulls back, he tells him, “That’s nasty, keep your mouth away from me.”

 

That’s completely the opposite of what he was saying, earlier, and Mox reminds him. “Thought it was a pretty mouth, you weren’t complaining when you thought it was gonna be around your cock.” He opens the door, then, ushers Leakee out with a hand on his back, and smiles again. Almost means it, this time. “Ta ta for now.”

 

He shuts the door before Leakee can reply, and Mox stands on his side, listening through the thin material, counts to five as slow as he can stand it. Hand in his pocket, he surveys the playing field through the peephole, counting all the perfectly aligned pieces. There’s only one move that would mean anything, though, only one he can make.

 

When he reaches six, Mox swings the door open, slouching in the doorway, just hidden from the view of the car. He pulls up his sweatshirt to scratch at his stomach, revealing a line of dark purple marks just above his waistband. Leakee turns and eyes him, a distinct warning, there, and Mox raises an eyebrow, dares him to make a sound. He removes his hand from his pocket, along with Leakee’s phone, spinning it between his fingers with a smile, just to remind Leakee of what Mox is hanging on to, that he holds all the cards.

 

He tosses it to him across the gap, and Leakee catches it effortlessly, despite the concentration it must take to keep his nostrils flared in such a fashion. “Remember to be careful, babe,” Mox calls after him when he continues his walk away. “Not everyone’s as nice as me!”

 

He’s cackling, a little, as Leakee finally drifts out of sight. Just teases the checkmate, the ace up his sleeve. The game could still go on.


	4. skin you with my tongue

Domination has been the name of the game ever since he returned to HWA. Mox spent a long time away from his town, retreating tactically after he lost his belt—and it's still his belt, no matter who holds it, no matter how long it’s been since it was last in his hands, that title was everyone’s until it was his—licking his wounds and trying to enjoy his time in Puerto Rico. But, back in Cincinnati, the last three months seemed such a waste, letting other people take his spotlight and chase his glory while Mox had nothing to show for it.

 

When he waltzed back through the doors two weeks ago—or burst through in a fit of rage, dragging several of the security guards behind him, same fucking difference—he was all but handed a title match, even if he had to beat everyone in sight and threaten to burn the building down around them. Which he earned, which he deserved, because he never should have lost that belt back in September. He should have been the champion this entire time, and everyone was refusing to acknowledge it. It was an _insult_ to all that he’s accomplished in HWA.

 

But, then, three nights ago, when they raised his hand, when they handed his title back to him—his arms reaching out to cradle it like a baby, like his fucking baby, all his, no one else’s—it looked—it looked like just a belt. Tarnished, worn, like a cheap, flimsy imitation of the titles he could be, _should_ be going after.

 

He’s on top of the mountain, again, and it was the easiest thing. It’s worthless. It means nothing at all.

 

Mox throws his belt across the room—of course it’s trash, of course it means nothing, it belongs to _him_ , after all—kicks the drained beer can next to his foot that way too, just to hear it ricochet off the wall. Turns out it’s not so empty, spraying across the floor and against another chair, but that’s not really his problem. Someone else can worry about it when they find the mess, there are janitors for that shit. He has bigger issues to deal with, ones that concern him directly, so he grabs the title off of the ground and doesn’t bother to brush it off before slinging it over his shoulder.

 

The last two days straight are one big hangover, and when a few people in the hallway ask about his bleary eyes and lethargic step, Mox grins with only the side of his face they can see and says he’s had a lot to celebrate, this New Year’s, doesn’t bring up the one-man memorial he held for the condition of his company upon his return. It’s a sad state of affairs, when the place he’s held in such high esteem, the spot he worked so hard to get to, is unable to provide him any semblance of the challenge he’s seeking, the need for battle that’s been stringing him so tight, recently. But Mox is gonna change that, the best way to get anything done around here. By seeing to it himself.

 

He’s already steamrolled his way through the organizers, through the only goddamn person who still considered him a friend, here, because he doesn’t fucking need friends to get to the peak and stay there, he just needs people to climb on top of, needs someone who’s willing to just try and knock him off. No one’s gonna stick around in his corner, anyway, and Mox isn’t about to return the favor. And if that leads to his downfall, if someone takes him out, well. He has absolutely no qualms about taking as many of them out with him as possible. He’s gonna die young, anyway, and there’s no reason not to enjoy what he has, here, as long as he’s got it; that will be his legacy, after all, tearing apart everything in his path, scattering the pieces in the wind. He’s already started, and the destruction will just increase from here on out.

 

He has a title defense tonight, three days after his victory. Or, rather, he’s gonna create one out of thin air. The powers that be won’t give him an opponent to face, because they don’t want the title on him but they can’t find anyone else they’d rather have carry it, so Mox is going to go out there tonight and make a rousing speech and hope that not every single man in that locker room is as chicken shit as he thinks they are. Hope that someone can prove there’s still competition in this company, that the HWA isn’t a complete waste of his time.

 

But, as he’s going through the motions and getting ready for his match, there’s—something feels different. It starts with a tingling in his shoulder, right where the title is sitting over his jacket.

There’s a charge in the air. His lips pull tight over his teeth and he can’t hold still, jittering even as he’s walking. By the time Moxley spots Leakee, standing down the hallway looking uncomfortable and out of place—could he ever really be _in_ place, anywhere? He stands out like a beacon, one big fucking ‘come hither’ flare—shifting uneasily against the wall, he’s not even surprised. Just thinks, yes, another thing he can fucking rip to shreds.

 

“You’re late,” he calls out, swaggering down the hall. Leakee’s eyes dart over while the rest of his body remains perfectly still, until they actually connect with Mox, and widen. He startles, actually steps back and away a bit. Mox grins bigger. “My birthday was last month, Christmas was last week. See you kept my present wrapped, though.” He lets his gaze fall down to leer at Leakee’s crotch. It feels like he’s doing that a lot, the exact curve of those jeans burned into his brain. When his eyes swing back up, Leakee is still looking at him, but he’s not focused in on Mox’s face, misses the gesture.

 

“Your hair’s pink,” Leakee states by way of greeting, almost a question but not quite, nose wrinkled at a concept he apparently can’t wrap his head around, like hair isn’t just hair, whatever you do to it. It’s not the dumbest thing Mox has ever done, anyway, not by a long shot. He has little to no impulse control—it’s a fucking miracle this is the only unnatural color that found its way in there, that there’re no piercings on his body except the ones he put in his ears himself. There’s a beat of silence while Leakee stares, considering. “What the hell you do that for? Makes you look like even more of a jackass.”

 

“You know,” Moxley smiles, leans in real close, like his next words are a most important secret. He delights in the way Leakee tries in vain to move away. It’s nothing out of the ordinary, really, but it’s more, now, like hair dye is some contagious disease that’s spread via contact. He pictures, momentarily, Leakee with flaming pink hair, dour look spread across his face, pulling sunglasses over his eyes as if that would hide his shame, and can’t help but laugh. Whatever happens tonight, happens, but Mox makes it a personal goal to get Leakee to grab hold of some strands, later. “You know, that would sound much more vitriolic coming from someone who’s never had my cock in their mouth, babe.”

 

The way Leakee’s eyes flash in anger—or, wait, is that humiliation?—is amazing. He laughs again with the high of it. “Didn’t see the Samoan Sadsack’s name on the match listing. So, that why you’re here? Come to see your boy kick ass and take names, then get down and dirty in the back?” He realizes what he’s just referred to himself as a moment too late, the way it makes his skin itch and crawl, a little, but Leakee doesn’t immediately grab hold of it and use it to shake him around like a rag doll.

 

“Don’t flatter yourself,” he says, instead, but that doesn’t come before he cringes, this nearly imperceptible pull of his neck toward his shoulders, and Mox sees it for what it is, smells the blood in the water.

 

“It _is_ ,” he crows, grins wider, gleeful—hasn’t really been able to scrub it from his face since he first spotted that familiar silhouette waiting on him. This is a gift _after_ all, hand delivered and everything. Leakee has _Jon Moxley_ scrawled _all_ over him, and he knows it, knows Mox knows it, hates Mox knows it if the downturn of his mouth is any indication. He can’t just let it go, though, obviously. He can’t. Leakee so rarely gives him any opening, any true occasion to hold something over his head, and Mox wants to dangle himself like a carrot, right in front of his nose, see if Leakee will bite.

 

Leakee’s eyes harden, as if he can save any face in this situation, and Mox spots the way a flush travels across his cheeks, nearly reaches out to feel just how warm they are under his palm. “What, am I _embarrassing_ you?” His voice is so loud. He wants it to surround them. “Cuz I can be, I can be your dirty little secret. If you want.”

 

Leakee sizes him up like a challenge has just been made. “It’s not like I would tell anyone,” he says, eyes narrowing as if he can play this off so easily. He’s aiming for stinging, but it’s kind of hard to take the offense seriously when he’s just as much as admitted to traveling to Cincy just to see Mox. There’s certainly no other excuse, is there? He’s a beacon, a big flashing neon arrow pointing right to Mox. “Why would I want anyone to know someone like you is hanging around someone like me?” Moxley laughs at the way he twists it around, tries to play it off as though Mox is the one chasing him down.

 

“Don’t flatter yourself,” Moxley mocks his previous words, pressing closer and laying a hand against the scruff on Leakee’s cheek, patting it a couple times. It’s hotter than he would have imagined—Mox wishes he could sustain himself purely on Leakee’s embarrassment and discomfort, because this is _delicious_. “It’s unbecoming.”

 

Leakee pulls away from him in one smooth motion, and Mox lets him go, enjoying every single minute of this. His eyes slide down and away from Mox’s face, and stop on the title that’s resting against his shoulder. “That still yours?” he asks, voice not even disbelieving, as if he understands no one could truly take it away, and Mox beams at him. God, Leakee’s an unbelievable asshole most of the time, but maybe he is, a little, too, and maybe it really does take one to know one. Leakee knows, knows what Mox does, that the belt is something that is tied into his DNA, that is part of him, and he wants to take the metal plates and embed their design into Leakee’s skin, trace the indents with his tongue.

 

“You like it?” he asks, looking away to glance at the title, shifting it against his jacket. It’s the first time he realizes that Leakee’s fully dressed while here he stands, in his ring gear, trunks and boots and knee pads and jacket with no shirt underneath, and Leakee is not even sneaking a peek. It’s fucking rude, is what it is, his abs on full display and no one taking in the sight, so Mox casually runs a hand over his bare torso and down the muscles, watching as Leakee’s eyes are drawn down to follow it with a frown before he catches himself. He very carefully doesn’t smile, but can’t really keep the amusement out of his voice when he tells Leakee, “Cuz I’ve been thinking, I’ve been thinking about it. It’s a little too lightweight, isn’t it, a little too heavy.”

 

Leakee is watching him, the hints of confusion hanging around the edges of his face. He likes him best like this, silent and two steps behind.

 

Mox blinks, once, twice, turns the thought over in his head a couple times, before deciding it’s best not to examine it at all. He likes when Leakee’s disoriented, when he has the upper hand, and that’s all there is to it.

 

“What is that supposed to mean?”

 

Mox hums a little under his breath, waits to see if Leakee will move closer, if he’s quiet enough to lure him in. He doesn’t, but he isn’t moving away, either, standing his ground and furthering conversation, and it’s all under that general air of disinterest that he carries like a fucking shield, and Mox bets he hates it, can’t stand that someone has figured out how to hit him behind it. The fingers of his left hand curl over the metal plate on his shoulder, settling his own shield into place. Not that he needs one, to go up against Leakee. It’s just— _he likes him best like this_ —just in case. “Exactly what I said, is what it means. You ever feel like you’re above something, like maybe it’s time to move on?”

 

Those dark eyes stare at him for a second, narrowing like it’s a trick question. “Around you? Constantly,” Leakee finally says, the dig falling far short of where he probably wanted it to lodge under Mox’s skin.

 

“Real nice,” he scoffs, scowling back, anyway, because there’s appearances to maintain. “Keep this up and I won’t even fuck you with the belt on, later.”

 

Leakee laughs, more a jeer, though Moxley can just make out the thread of actual amusement behind it. He’s _adorable_. Mox wonders if he’d punch him in the face if he told him that. It’s almost an incentive to voice it out loud. “Is that supposed to be some kind of punishment?”

 

“Be as self-deceiving as you want.” He leans in as close as he dares, then a bit nearer, still, enough that his lips brush Leakee’s cheek when he speaks, feel the warmth coming off him intimately. This close, it’s even more intoxicating. “We both know not gagging on my cock is the worst kind of torture.” The rough drag of his mouth over the flushed skin on the last syllable, pulling back from the circular shape of the vowel into a straight line, he swears something sparks from the sharp flint of Leakee’s cheekbone, a smouldering feeling slowly catching fire in his veins. Mox knew, from the moment he first spotted Leakee, that he’d be blowing off the skank he had hanging all over him for the earlier part of the evening, but the way he’s suddenly burning, eating up all the oxygen in his brain, has him looking forward to it more than he’s comfortable admitting to.

 

He reaches out to push against Leakee’s chest, pressing him back against the wall while Mox backs up a step or two, puts that distance back between them. He expected something like disgust on Leakee’s face, but what greets him instead is that same unimpressed glare as always, something simmering just underneath, like Leakee is waiting for Mox to prove something. “Now,” he says, makes his voice fill the space again, chin up and chest puffed out, “I have a match to go win, and after they raise my arm in victory, I’m going to strap this thing on and make sure you can’t walk right for a week.”

 

“Is that so.” Just the hint of a smile there. Goddamn it, how many times is Mox gonna have to put this bastard down before he stops issuing challenges he can’t win?

 

Mox backs away, arms spread wide, grabbing his title in one hand. On the other side of things, he kind of admires Leakee’s zealous commitment to pretending he hasn’t given anything away, his steadfast belief that he can still beat Moxley at his own game. He’s dead wrong, of course, but he’s the one who keeps laying his pride on the line. Mox will keep calling his bet, so long as he’s winning.

 

“Get that ass ready for me!” he cries out, voice high-pitched and breaking in the middle, his free hand reaching out, all fingers outstretched. He’s nearly skipping backwards, and his proclamation has drawn the attention of more than one innocent bystander. Leakee is glaring at him, as if he should look chastised, but while Mox promised something about being a dirty little secret, he has significantly more experience with being dirty, and a lot less with being little or secret.

 

They’re already waiting on him, when he gets to Gorilla, but that’s how it works, when you’re the champ; everyone has to run on your time, when you’re the big fish, when you’re the one everyone comes to see. Mox is given several stern looks that promise meeting upon meeting worth of tongue-lashings, later—though he can think of seven different ways he’d rather see tongues used, and that’s just off the top of his head—before music hits and he’s ushered through the door, making his entrance into the ring.

 

“You think I’d be in a good mood tonight,” he says into the mic, having to force back a smile right before he says the words. Moxley doesn’t know who he caught this damn grin from, but he does know that Leakee showing up here tonight, unbidden, for apparently no other reason than to see Mox, it doesn’t change anything. He’s still the HWA Champion, and he still doesn’t know what that means, anymore, and thinking about the man who’s conveniently placed himself right next to the one bright goddamn light shining on the audience isn’t what’s going to help him figure it out. “You’d think I’d be in a real _jovial_ mood this evening.”

 

He shouldn’t be, doesn’t hear it in his voice, can’t be, isn’t—fuck, fuck, _fuck_ , he isn’t, but there’s the tiniest hint of something in his stomach telling him that he is. “I closed out 2006 a two-time HWA Heavyweight Champion. But really, I’m in a very surly mood,” and Mox isn’t sure who he’s trying to convince of this, the audience or Leakee or himself, because he is but he isn’t, he’s confident and irritable and bouncing and hair-trigger, they’re all different but they’re all the same and he’s all these things but he’s not focused, so he takes a moment to breathe and looks out at the crowd, the area where the faces are familiar but not ones he’s ever seen with heat in their eyes and postcoital gratification in the turn of their lips and recenters himself, finds that anger.

 

The words start coming out faster, after that, building on that foundation until he’s seething, again, spitting in his frustration, calling anybody, anyone, out to fight, to hit him, to make him bleed, to take something from him and tell him he can’t have it back. He’s hoping for Matt Stryker, or Cody Hawk, maybe, both always get in too deep, don’t know how to quit while they’re ahead, but when someone comes barreling into the ring and it’s Brian Jennings, Moxley rolls his eyes so hard it’s amazing he doesn’t stroke out right there.

 

Jennings starts screaming at him, calling for Mox to shut up, then complimenting him on his athleticism, his body, like he’s propositioning Mox for something other than a match, and if he hadn’t just tossed his own microphone to Jennings, he’d call him on it, too. He points to the title resting on Moxley’s shoulder, tells him “You don’t deserve it. You don’t respect it. You’re a piece of trash,” which gets the loudest cheer the crowd has given tonight, and the only way Mox keeps his calm is by sucking in a shuddering breath, reminding himself that he might not deserve it, but certainly no one else here has reached out to grab an opportunity, no one _else_ does. It’s a weak moment when he came out here feeling the opposite, the way he can feel his offended frown crumple into something more somber, and he drops his head to conceal it, prays that Leakee didn’t see, from where he’s sitting, because Mox will never fucking live that shit down.

 

He should refuse the request for a match, after that, because Jennings has cost him something, now, but the old man is squaring up to face him, and if Mox can’t beat the fucking _Buffalo Bad Boy_ then he has no place in this company, anyway. He’s going to press Jennings’ face into the mat, going to take a pound of flesh out of his back to teach him that there’s a price to pay for trying to take from him. Mox throws the mic and title down, strips his jacket off as he stares Jennings down, and a bell rings in the background.

 

There are some, a few, points, here and there, where Mox thinks that’s it, that he has the guy put away, but then he’ll miraculously pull some resilience out of his ass and Mox has to put him down all over again. There’s more back and forth to the match than he was expecting, being up against such a fucking old timer, but it’s the end that matters, always, and one mistake, one stupid fucking mistake later, sliding too far when he drops an elbow, it’s a different ending than he saw coming.

 

He taps.

 

He taps—fucking _submits_ , in the middle of the ring, in front of the commentators and the audience and whatever stupid kids are wasting their life at home, watching on TV, wishing to be in his shoes—to a fucking crossface hold.

 

The bell is ringing, he can hear it in the distance, somewhere past the pain still shooting up his arm. There’s a new HWA Heavyweight Champion, a name being called, and it’s not his.

 

Mox just lays there for a few seconds, staring up at the ceiling, watching the lights twist and shift in different patterns until he doesn’t want to rip his own arm off. Either of them—his left arm feels like it’s been stuck in a socket, shocks radiating from the shoulder down, the fingers a little numb when he tries tapping them together, and the right, well. It’s a fucking traitor.

 

He finally rolls out of the ring, the burning muscle clutched to his chest, and he can hear the sounds of the rest of the roster coming out, congratulating Jennings on his victory. Which is fine, that’s all fucking fine, because he won, good for him, though he didn’t win so much as Mox lost, and no one comes to check on the loser, anyway. Either way, he doesn’t turn back and look. Instead, Mox trudges to the locker room, feet dragging a bit, and plants himself on a bench.

 

The last place he wants to be, when that celebration is over and they all come pouring back in, is right here, having to look any of them in the face. But even sitting upright feels beyond his capabilities, right now, so Mox just lays down on the hard wood and closes his eyes.

 

He _hates_ submitting, admitting that there are some things that hurt beyond his capability to withstand, hates that he tapped when he himself has at least five more painful holds than the goddamn Buffalo Wing in his arsenal, and yet. He’s the one flat on his back, here, shifting against the stiff board underneath him. He’s the one who had everything to lose—now he has, and it feels different than he expected it to.

 

A lot less like he’d been challenged. A lot more like he’d been struck down.

 

A sudden weight on his chest surprises him enough to jump, a little, before a cold chill starts seeping into the skin, starting to give Mox goosebumps down his arms. When he opens his eyes, blinks lazily up into the light, he’s greeted with the sight of Leakee leaning over him. Goddamn, he has a nice face, those cheekbones and full lips and eyebrows framing it all, and Mox strikes out with his good arm, the one without the pins and needles dancing all up and down it, and the fucking thing lets him down again when it doesn’t connect with Leakee’s slight grin. When his eyes peer down at the item resting on him, it turns out to be a cold pack, fresh out of the freezer if the feel of it is any indication.

 

“Figures you’d be too stupid to remember to ice that arm,” Leakee drops on him, retreating until his back is up against the lockers, and it’s a good thing, too, or Mox would wring his neck right now, just grab hold and refuse to let go until he’s on his knees, gasping for air.

 

He grabs the ice pack on his chest, throws it against the metal right next to Leakee’s face, satisfied with the ringing sound that echoes when it hits its mark.

 

“Get the fuck out of my sight,” he warns, but stays in place, unwilling to move from his spot for the moment. “I know this is a real fuckin’ difficult concept for you to grasp, but most people don’t wanna see your face hangin’ around.” Mox closes his eyes again, just to illustrate his point, or in utter frustration, whatever. Same difference. He doesn’t hear any movement, though, and when they reopen, Leakee is still standing there, watching him. A single eyebrow raises, completely unflappable, before he leans down and picks up the ice pack from the floor.

 

“And I don’t want to deal with your temper tantrum.” Yet here he is, staring Moxley down, instead of walking out the _clearly labeled_ exit. The man either has some grand scheme that he’s working toward bringing to fruition, or he’s just plain idiotic, because if he thinks it gets better from here, that anything about Mox is an improvement from this, then he hasn’t been listening the entire time. Leakee tosses the ice pack back. It lands on his stomach just as Mox twists on the bench, a little, and slips to the ground, and Mox glances at it, grimaces at the pull in his joint. It’s not really moving right, or at all, he notices; might be dislocated. It’s swelling, at the very least, but he absolutely does not want the cool pack on the floor, even as his fingers twitch to grab it.

 

The flinch doesn’t go undetected. “Ice your damn arm,” Leakee growls, voice not as low as it was probably meant to be, but it still makes something else twitch, below his waist. Fuck him, he’s not allowed to distract Mox when he’s sulking, when he has every right to. Reluctant, he snatches the pack off the ground, pressing it against his shoulder, and hisses when he jams it against the tender joint a little too hard. The cold is jarring, but it feels good, though he’s not going to give Leakee even a glimmer of the idea that Mox appreciates something that he’s done. He chooses, rather, not to acknowledge him at all, hoping that he’ll finally slink away. A minute or two tick by, but he’s still there, leaning silently against the lockers, like he’s under the impression that his presence is wanted, right now. Mox sighs into the space between them, voices his thoughts out loud, because if Leakee’s gonna hang around, then he’s gonna deal with whatever Mox decides to throw at him.

 

“I lost.” Such a small sentence, such a small fucking word, for such a big feeling. Because it is, it’s a big fucking deal.

 

“I know. I was there.” Mox can hear the loftiness hanging around behind the words, feels like there’s an _I told you so_ coming, though Leakee told him no such thing. He crosses his arms over his chest, finally looks like he’s settling into his space up against the metal. This conversation is having the opposite effect of what Moxley intended. “Thought you had him, with the sleeper.”

 

“That makes two of us,” Mox grumbles, head still resting against the hard bench. He’s trying to find some silver lining, here, because he wanted, he _asked_ for this, for someone to come and take it away, give him another chance to prove himself, but now that his belt is gone, _again_ , all he can think of is the fact that, tonight, he _didn’t_ deserve it.

 

That he is trash.

 

“Yeah, but you were too cocky with the cover on that side slam. Should have gone for it immediately, and maybe not looked like such a prick when you did.”

 

“My finisher. It should have been over. He kicked out of my fucking finisher.” It’s weird, being here, discussing the match he just lost—forfeited, chose to fucking _quit_ —with Leakee. Any other time, it’s so easy to forget that he grew up around wrestling, has been watching it for years, but now, with him pulling move names and discussing Moxley’s strategical errors, it hits him that Leakee probably knows nearly as much about it as he does, far more than he’s let on, and he’s never even stepped foot inside a ring.

 

Leakee grins, wry, not really all that amused. “Should probably work on that, then.” Mox just hums in response, thoughtful. Wonders if he _shouldn’t_ try to find something more effective. Leakee’s still eyeing him, pensive in his own way, before he breaks out this charmer:  “You still down to fuck, even without the title?”

 

Mox gives a full on snort. Leakee has been around him too much, if he’s starting to sound like that, and he’s hung around Leakee far too long if he can tell the difference. He nearly chucks the ice pack at him again. It hasn’t lost it’s chill, yet, but it’s warming up. Mox isn’t sure how much life it has left in it. That’s the only reason he doesn’t throw it away, yet. He wants to see just how long it will last. “Yeah. Right. Go fuck your _self_ , I don’t want your pity screw.”

 

The spot against the lockers is finally vacated, and Leakee steps closer, looming over him again, before squatting down to bring himself nearly level with Mox. They’re glaring at each other, neither one willing to break away first, and that charged feeling from earlier is back. It tingles in the exact same spot, despite the numbness slowly creeping into his shoulder, and if it weren’t for the familiarity of that prickling sensation, Mox would attribute it to the injury. His head’s beginning to swim, a little, a combination of the pain and the shock wearing off, and the discomfort is grounding, in a way.

 

“Good, because I ain’t feeling anything like pity,” Leakee says, and, Jesus Christ, doesn’t he ever blink? His eyes aren’t wide, but they’re very open, deep. Mox wonders how many people he’s talked into bed, just like this, and feels a weird surge of pride he’s going to blame on the lightheadedness that it was him that led them to that point, way back when, not Leakee. “You brought this all on yourself, Jon.”

 

However his answering grin looks, it’s enough that Leakee’s eyebrow raises in response, seeming as though he’d like to back away, but refuses to give up that ground in this case. “Did I,” Mox says, narrowing his eyes, because as far as he’s concerned, yeah, he may have asked for a match, but the HWA brought it on him, by being utterly incapable of providing anything stimulating for him upon his return. He’ll show them there’s hell to pay, for it. “My arm’s injured, can’t do anything too strenuous. Should have just about enough energy for you to suck me off.”

 

Mox drops the ice pack to reach for his trunks, thinking that it’s an image he wouldn’t mind burning into the retinas of the rest of the locker room, but Leakee stops the progression of his hand, wraps thick fingers around his wrist. “Like I’d do that here, if at all,” he says, like Moxley’s just told the most unfunny joke he’s ever heard. Leakee releases his hand, before he’s up and grabbing the ice pack once more, settling it too hard to be gentle against Mox’s shoulder. “Where are your keys?”

 

Mox sits up, finally, holding the barely cool pack against his arm more for show than anything. “That’s sweet, really,” he coos, ignoring the way his skin is starting to itch again. “Making sure I get home safe and sound, but I’m a big boy. I can handle myself.”

 

“Hardly,” Leakee deadpans, staring him down until Mox finally points out his locker and rattles off the combination. “I came to see you get your ass handed to you, and I think it could stand to take it once more, tonight.”

 

Mox laughs, low and ugly, rough like gravel in his mouth. “One of these days,” he says, even as his feet start carrying him after Leakee, “I’m going to tear your ass up, put you down for good. You think you can take me?” Leakee glances at him, unimpressed, and, granted, it would probably sound considerably more ominous were one arm not cradled against his chest, but that only spurs him on. He moves quickly, crowds Leakee against the wall, makes sure he’s the only thing the other man can see. “You think you’ve seen it all? When I’m done, you’ll know it. You’ll stay down.”

 

“That’s funny,” Leakee says, just the hint of a smirk slowly tilting the corner of his mouth. His eyes trail down, and when Mox follows them, they’re taking in the sight of the semi that’s been starting to strain against his trunks for the last ten minutes. Leakee places his hand against Mox’s hip, thumb stroking once over the jut of bone. “Because when I’m done, you’ll get it up.” He pushes past Mox, then, continues toward the exit, and Mox follows, eventually, fuming, because why the fuck didn’t he think to say that first.

 

\---

 

He’s lying on his bed after, looking up at the headlights that flash against the ceiling as a car pulls out of the parking lot. There’s a lot of silence hanging in the air, big, expansive, but not heavy, not crushing. It’s brittle, broken sporadically by the sound of a gasping breath, and Mox is lulled by the sudden punches of noise and the blood still making its way back to his brain.

 

Leakee is just starting to pull his clothes back on, but he stops at his boxers and lays back down on the bed. Mox stares at his chest, still heaving up and down, and doesn’t know what the fuck is going on.

 

“What are you doing?” he demands to know, rolling over and spreading out further on the bed until he’s pressed up against Leakee. There’s enough room for both of them, really, but Leakee is lingering here, in his space, which is not normal, even a little, so Mox makes sure to inch every part of himself that he can into Leakee’s space to drive the point home.

 

Leakee stretches his body long before shoving at Moxley’s arm, knocking it off his chest. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m getting comfortable.” He’s not smiling, which makes it seem less like a joke, but offers no further explanation, and Mox cannot wrap his head around what he’s getting at, here.

 

“Do you—do you want to _stay_?” he asks, and if he sounds a little horrified, well, for-fucking-give him for that. His bed is rented out hourly, and he neither requires nor desires that anyone stay past their initial welcome. Never mind the fact that it’s a move he can’t reconcile with all the information he’s gathered to date on Leakee, who has a special type of abhorrence for Mox and the pervasive sense of defilement that follows him everywhere.

 

“Not even remotely,” Leakee responds, arm over his eyes now to block out the light. Mox wonders if that isn’t by design, because his gaze is trailing over the tanned skin and muscle instead of concentrating on the line of his mouth, trying to read the visible part of his face. Guy’s trying to fucking dicknotize him, and he is so not about that shit. “I drove your ass home, though, and now mine is stranded here until you take me back to my car.”

 

Goddamn, with everything else going a million miles an hour around him, Mox nearly forgot the most important part of Leakee showing up in town unannounced. There is no brother in the wings, waiting to pick him up, because there is no brother here, because Leakee came by himself. “Why are you here?” he asks, the words just slipping out of his mouth before he can filter them. Leakee moves his arm to raise an eyebrow, and Mox waves a hand dismissively. “Not, like, _here_ here, I know why the fuck you’re _here_ , you’re far from the only one beating down my door for another taste,” Leakee makes a face at that, a scowl that twists into a disgusted frown, and Mox smirks over at him, “but, like. In town, here.”

 

“Why does it matter?” Leakee responds, eyes narrowed and suspicious, full of confusion again. Mox is uneasy— _likes him best like this_ —looking back. “Touring the Bengals compound. Draft is in a few months, and I have a contact, there.”

 

He answered, no stony silence or misdirection, without waiting to find out why Mox wanted to know. For some reason that makes him itch, again.

 

“Well, I ‘spose the couch is here for a reason,” he says, shifting against the sheets, the rough fabric scratching the prickling between his shoulder blades. Files that little nugget of information away in the box in his head he keeps just for things he’s learned about Leakee, the one that’s becoming considerably more useful than he thought it would be. “There’s an extra blanket somewhere, probably, if you look around. Unless you wanna freeze your ass off. We all got kinks, I won’t judge.”

 

Leakee is still staring at him. So many of their conversations are half made up of him nearly gaping in disbelief. “I’m the guest, here, shouldn’t you take the couch?” At least he knows well enough to understand they won’t be sharing the bed. If everything that’s happened already has Mox ready to tear his own skin off, sleeping next to Leakee would be a gun to his head, an _intimacy_ that he wants no part of.

 

“Excuse you, dumbass,” he rolls his eyes. “I’m gravely injured, here.” His shoulder, as well as his pride. Mox swallows. “Lest you forget. I need comfort and stability and, oh yeah, this is also my fuckin’ house, so shoo.” He waves Leakee away with his good arm, chuckles as he mumbles but, wonder of all wonders, rolls off the bed and heads for the bathroom.

 

“Hey!” he calls after Leakee, waits until he actually turns back before he continues. His eyes don’t quite meet Mox, spread nude over the top of the sheets. Mox grins, bright and sharp, but Leakee doesn’t see it. “You do know, you know you could have brought your own car over and you’d be on your way. Not like you’d care about my lack of transportation, right?” Leakee is staring back at him, now, his face doing something very complicated that Mox doesn’t understand. “Right? Just a little thought to help you drift off to sleep.”

 

Leakee’s mouth opens as if to retort, but closes again before he continues to the bathroom. “Sweet dreams!” Mox shouts as the door to the bathroom slams shut, rattling on its hinges. He’s snickering, more because his mouth doesn’t know what else to do than from actual amusement, because he’s not sure he finds the situation all that funny. He makes sure, by the time Leakee’s out, settling himself on the couch, to appear asleep.


	5. no one leaves a scar quite like i can

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one took a little longer than expected, due to several factors, not the least of which was doing a complete overhauling edit no less than three times. Usually I end up taking things out, but in this case, several things were added. So, at least you have the longest chapter yet in return for your patience?
> 
> warning for erotic asphyxiation in the second half

The next morning, Mox shoots up in bed at the sound of something moving around his apartment. The shitty little battery operated clock he keeps next to the bed — the one with the single burned out line that makes the last eight look like a zero and guarantees Mox is always ten minutes later than he means to be — is halfway across the room before he realizes he’s thrown it. The smashing sound it makes against the wall promises even more missing lights, if it’s even still in one piece, and Mox scowls, because he fucking liked the thing.

 

Leakee turns his head back from where it twisted to watch the clock go sailing by, and one eyebrow is raised. “You have really terrible aim,” he comments, voice rougher than Mox is used to hearing, like he’s still waking up, and his hair is all disheveled in a way Mox has never seen, not even after sex. It’s a little like peeking behind the curtain, like something you’re not supposed to notice or see, and he nearly grins to himself before he remembers he’s mad. He’s mad because now he has no clock and no alarm that sounds like Beaker from the Muppets getting run over repeatedly by a car and he’s awake at what is probably the ass crack of dawn, and his arm isn’t really hurting anymore though the ice most likely had nothing to do with that whatsoever.

 

“More used to throwing punches. Fucking excuse me for not being a world class pitcher.”

 

The corner of Leakee’s mouth twitches, ever so slightly, and Mox can _hear_ the words already, doesn’t know exactly what they’ll be but he can feel the tone of them, has a middle finger up before they’re halfway out. “I could have told you that already.” Mox’s scowl deepens more as a matter of habit than anything. It may be early, but Leakee’s not even trying. Mox squints at him, then toward the window, the sunlight seeping in through the cracks in the blinds. It’s fucking freezing in here, Mox thinks, and huddles himself further under the blanket, wrapping it up and around his neck, amazed that Leakee is still just standing there in his boxers, staring back at him. Not that he’s complaining, or anything. Except, yeah, he is; Leakee is standing there shirtless, staring at him, and Mox is sporting some impressive morning wood that could use some attention because he’s certainly not serving any other purpose, here, and he’s about to make that happen when Leakee has to open his mouth again and speak. “You have anything to eat around here?”

 

And all at once, it doesn’t matter that he’ll be living without a convenient way to tell time from now on or that he could probably go ice skating in his bathroom or even that it’s too god damn early to function, because the sun and moon and planets or whatever the fuck it is that people care about are shining down here, have come into alignment, and Mox gives the most wicked grin he can manage and slowly slides the sheets down his body. “Now that you mention it.”

 

Leakee blinks at him, trying real hard to remain unmoved, but he's fighting a losing battle if the state of his boxers is any indication. Mox shivers in the cold, waits for the few seconds that seem like eternity. It’s a miracle his boner doesn’t just shrivel up and die under the cool air in here, but Leakee’s gaze is slowly heating up and Mox can feel it on his collarbone, of all places, warm and burning faster. “Fine,” Leakee sighs, because he talks a big game but he’s never really backed it up, avoiding Mox. There’s a magnetic pull, there, an electric spark between them, one that Mox hasn’t found before or been able to duplicate with anyone else, and not for lack of trying. He’s starting to think that might be important. It probably isn’t, but. It could be.

 

Leakee lumbers over to the bed like he’s under a trance, and Mox pulls his limbs in a little to clear some room for him before he gets another idea. A nice sloppy blow job sounds good, but he wants to up the ante, thinks that mouth in other places sounds a little better. He flips over and shakes his ass a bit, just once back and forth, before sticking it in the air. “Uh, what are you doing?” Leakee asks, and when Moxley glances over at him he’s visibly concerned, eyes darting from Mox’s butt to his face, but he still sinks down onto the mattress, and for some reason that amuses Mox. He shakes with silent laughter, pressing his lips against his arm, and Leakee’s expression darkens, a little. “I thought—”

 

“Don’t be coy, now,” Mox tutts, shaking his head. His shoulder is a little uncomfortable in his current position, so he shifts his weight to rest more on the right arm. “You’re the one who asked.” And now that Mox has settled in, he’s really looking forward to it. It’s not very often he gets someone to eat him out, and with the way Leakee loves to hear himself talk around Mox, he thinks that tongue will be put to good use.

 

“I don’t do that.” Leakee is quick to shut him down, but there’s the slightest thread of distress in the words, and Mox sighs deeply. He’s annoyed, though, looking at Leakee’s face, can’t believe that no one has ever taken the opportunity to show him this. Spending time with Leakee is always draining, in one way or another, and Mox wants to say it’s his patience being tested this time, but it feels more like — he doesn’t know. Something else.

 

“Sooner or later you’re gonna have to find ways to expand your own horizons,” he says, rolling his eyes. “I can’t keep holdin’ your hand here, princess.”

 

“Don’t call me that,” Leakee snaps, watching as Mox pushes up into a kneeling position. “And when have you ever held my hand?” Mox ignores him, continues shuffling himself around and pulling at Leakee’s boxers, working on getting the things off as quickly as possible. Fortunately, the man moves with him, shifting his legs and hips to help.

 

“C’mere,” he says, still on his knees but further down the bed, sitting up on them now. “S’ good. I’ll show you.” And Leakee can repay the favor, maybe, because Mox is awake, now, bloodstream singing at the thought of what they’re about to do, and the only way he’s gonna get back to sleep is a white-out orgasm or a six pack, and he already knows there’s nothing in the fridge. Leakee is staring at him, suspicious, as if wondering if Mox is going to fuck him over somehow, and sure, yeah, he’s planning on it, but it’s a different way of doing it than they’re both used to, a way to screw him without using words that still involves his tongue. “C’mon, come here,” he stresses when Leakee doesn’t move right away, moves forward himself and meets him with an open mouthed kiss.

 

It’s stale morning breath and tired, uncoordinated movements, but it’s also Leakee stifling a sigh that tries to escape into Mox’s mouth and it’s his dick pressing into Mox’s hip, hardening further when he pulls back enough and words just start falling out, “Lemme show you, c’mon, fuckin’ ride my face, I’ll let you,” and Mox is going to remember the look of astonished desire on his face for a very, very long time. Thinks he’s going to have a lot of trouble ever forgetting anything about Leakee.

 

He moves away then, watches as Leakee looks back with slanted eyes, then nods, more than likely to himself, and flips over, pulling up a pillow to rest his arms on, holding his head in his hands. “Don’t look so excited,” Mox taunts a little, running a hand over one of Leakee’s ass cheeks, taking a few seconds to calm his pulse, heart beating so rapidly in his chest he can feel it in his throat. God damn, he’s excited enough for the both of them, the idea that he is the first one to ever do this to Leakee burning through his brain like wildfire, because he’s the first but he’ll also be the last; anyone else could try, in the future, but this will always be the standard of comparison. He gets to have Leakee, mark him from the inside out, and that’s really all Mox has ever wanted, with him. He wants Leakee to think about him, about his hands and his cock and his mouth, all the time, even when he doesn’t want to, even when he thinks he isn’t, and the idea makes his dick twitch, makes Mox as hard as he thinks he’s ever been.

 

“You still back there?” Leakee asks, and it would be a fair question, with Mox kneeling here, just staring at his ass in all its glory, but there’s a waver to his voice, annoyance or nerves or something, Mox isn’t quite sure. Whatever it is, it has Leakee turning back to glare at him over his shoulder. He certainly looks annoyed, and it’s downright _precious_ , what with the way Mox is about to fucking shatter all his preconceptions of the world. He’s not even a little bit prepared.

 

“Awfully impatient,” he scolds, laying a slap to Leakee’s ass, satisfied with the sharp smack that nearly echoes in the room. He’s expecting a growl, a cutting remark in return, but Leakee lets out this drawn out moan, a sound like Mox has never heard out of him, before, and he lets a grin split his face. Just barely restrains himself from repeating the action. “Seem anxious to get this all over with. Don’t know if you’re really that into it. What was it you said, you don’t do this?” He shuffles back a little, hands in the air. “It’s alright, forget it, you can just suck my dick.”

 

“God damn it, Mox,” Leakee snarls, and Mox chuckles, low and heated, because there’s that bite he was looking for, the familiar sting that feels a little more comfortable. He slides forward again, on his knees, plants a kiss to the base of Leakee’s spine. It’s got a really nice dip to it; picturesque, in fact, and Leakee’s frame is shaking ever so slightly. His cock is really into something about that, and if Mox doesn’t get started soon, he may blow his load before he gets Leakee’s mouth on him.

 

Mox shifts one knee between Leakee’s legs, uses it to nudge them further apart, and kisses him again, right where the red from his handprint is fading. One hand moves forward to grip at Leakee’s hip, squeezing it as a silent _ready?_ , thumbs digging into his cheeks before finally bringing his mouth to its destination.

 

The way Leakee jerks against him, Mox makes the executive decision to start slow, ease him into it a bit, just dragging wet lips in small kisses before giving a tiny press of tongue. Leakee sounds like he chokes on his, the noise not quite forming into a full groan. It spurs Mox on, and he starts going after Leakee in earnest, tongue tracing patterns over him, and when Leakee’s hips push back into his mouth, he can’t help but smile and laugh.

 

That is, until he slides his tongue in — every part he’s reaching so wet, and it’s all from him — alternating between fucking Leakee and leaving sucking kisses around him, and Leakee starts making the most beautiful sounds Mox has ever heard. They’re just the type of little noises that, if there’s a heaven for people like him, he imagines these sounds are what it would be made of, caught somewhere between whimpers and gasps. Mox feels a little high, the way Leakee is so clearly enjoying what he’s doing, and he fucking loves it. His hand trails from Leakee’s hip to his dick, starts stroking him through it, trying to concentrate on the movement of his tongue, on tracing his name in short flicks of it over muscle. But the noises don’t stop, they just increase in volume, interspersed with small grunts, echoing in his head and buzzing in his gut, and Mox feels as wrecked as Leakee sounds, has to physically wrap his other hand around and around in the sheets to keep from stopping everything he’s doing and jerking himself off right here and now.

 

Leakee finally comes with a shout, riding Mox’s tongue and fucking into Mox’s fist, and he can’t hold out another second, lets Leakee collapse while he takes himself in hand. The noises Leakee was making, before, they’ve stopped, now, but Mox replays them over and over in his head, falling forward, other hand bracing himself against that curve of lower back. He listens hard for a few delirious seconds to the harsh panting of Leakee’s breath, and that’s it, it’s enough, Mox comes hard in his own hand, marking Leakee up in the process.

 

Mox is flat on his back, again, staring up at the ceiling, and he’s not quite sure what just happened. The last twelve hours in a nutshell, really. Leakee picks his head up from where it was resting on his arms and looks back at him.

 

“Fuck,” he breathes. Mox likes the way he can hear his chest working in his voice. Then, he wrinkles his nose. “Seriously? You had to do that,” he asks, like the drying come on his back is the weight of the world and he’s Atlas, trying to hold it up. He looks really fucking good, like this — Mox doesn’t slow down enough to actually savor things, ever, but he really appreciates the way Leakee is on display, spread out naked across grey sheets, like one of those statues Mox is always mockingly comparing him to come to life. He wonders how many other people get to see this, when he doesn’t.

 

That’s not something he’s going to ask, though, doesn’t know how to make it not sound like something more, like something it isn’t, so Mox sits up and shrugs, instead, addresses the question rather than bring up more. “Didn’t want to wait for you to pull your brain back in through your dick,” he explains, because it doesn’t answer what Leakee is really asking and, more importantly, it doesn’t give anything away. Not that Mox really has an answer to give, besides it. He just really — he really likes what he did to Leakee, really likes how he responded, how it seemed to make him feel.

 

“You look...weird,” Leakee says, frowning as he pushes himself up. There’s a mess underneath him that Mox forgot about. He’ll have to wash his sheets today, or sleep on the couch tonight. Has to leave the apartment anyway to drive back to the arena. It’s easier to think about the monotonous details of his day, for once, than to concentrate on the way Leakee is watching him. “Besides the hair, I mean. Your face. It’s stranger than normal.”

 

“You always look weird,” Mox snaps at him, and Leakee makes a face that only serves to prove his point. He’s laughing, then, Mox’s apparent strangeness forgotten for the time being. Which is just as well, because his stomach is turning, the way Leakee could read the way he was feeling plain on his face. “Christ, I put up with an awful fuckin’ lot from you.”

 

Something sparkles in Leakee’s eyes, a little softer than the smirk that cuts across his face. “Wonder why that is,” he drawls, like he already knows, knows something Mox doesn’t. It’s absolutely ridiculous — he’s insufferable, and Mox is done with this conversation.

 

“Certainly not for the company.” He turns away, then, grumbling to himself about ungrateful conquests. There’s silence, for a while, before Leakee slides himself up and out of the bed, pulling himself to his feet.

 

“I’m disgusting, thanks to you,” he says, and that gets Mox to chance a glance over, peek at him all debauched and defiled. A glance turns into a sweep, eyes following the line of his body up his legs, his cock, that thick waist that makes saliva gather in Mox’s mouth, again. Fucking beautiful. He’ll gladly take the credit for that. “You owe me a shower.” Leakee pauses, considering. “Breakfast, too.”

 

Mox rolls his eyes, waves a hand toward the bathroom. “Be my guest,” he says, laying the sarcasm on thick. He’s annoyed, again, and he’d rather Leakee quit finding things to comment on in his expressions. “You want a tour or something? Can’t figure out the one knob?” he asks when Leakee doesn’t move immediately. He’s still looking at Mox, though, so Mox lets a sly smile cross his face in teasing. “Need help with those hard to reach areas? M’ pretty good at that.” He licks his lips, then, slow and deliberate, wetting them all over again with his tongue. Leakee’s face does several things at once, half flinch while his eyes track the movement.

 

“You’re fucking shameless, aren’t you.” He heads to the bathroom while Mox sort of flops down on the bed, watching him go.

 

There’s something on the tip of his tongue, something his mouth wants to say, but he doesn’t know the words, what they are or what they mean. And Mox doesn’t believe in thinking things over too much or too hard, in turning them over in his head until they become something different entirely, but he isn’t about to voice something when he’s not sure where it will get him, if it might put him at a disadvantage.

 

Leakee turns around in the doorway, looks back at Mox, and his voice pulls him out of those thoughts. “Well? You comin’ or not?” Mox takes a second to look around the room before he can stop himself, because he’s fairly certain Leakee can’t possibly be talking to him, but, well, there’s no one else here, and he did promise the man something to eat, after all. Wouldn’t want to let him down, now.

 

After a quick shower that consisted of Leakee on his knees — and if that sight alone wasn’t something that Mox would want to keep scorched into his retinas, an afterimage to relive over and over, the water pouring down around him only enhanced the visual, heated Mox’s blood in a way even the frigid air of the rest of the apartment couldn’t cool — and quickly kicking Mox out to actually get clean, they’re in the car, two steaming bags of Taco Bell resting on Leakee’s lap. The dashboard display reads 11:17, and Mox is indignant again in remembrance of the busted pieces of his clock.

 

“Can’t fuckin’ believe you ordered that much, tapped me out for the next few days,” he scowls again, his wallet significantly lighter than it was when they left.

 

As soon as he says the words, he's expecting Leakee to comment on the events of last night, but all he does is raise an eyebrow high enough that it’s visible over the glasses he pulled on. The sun shining in through the windows is bright enough cutting through them that Mox can nearly make out his eyes, if it weren’t for the glare. “I have protein requirements,” he says, like that’s some kind of excuse. “Didn’t hear you complaining about my body earlier. Either time.”

 

“That was before I knew the cost of upkeep, Jesus Christ.” Mox doesn't understand why Leakee spared him whatever cutting remark. He _must_ have thought it. Mox pulls into the driveway, takes the empty spot next to the only car in the lot. He doesn’t know what year it is, but the Jetta is scratched up enough around the edges that he can tell it’s not too new. Silver, too, either going for luxury look or too lazy to bother with choosing a color. One of the tires is under inflated, and a rim around another is starting to rust; either not enough cash to perform basic care, or expectant that he’ll get bailed out of any adverse situation he gets himself into with it. Mox doesn’t know why he’s trying to analyze Leakee by way of his car, of all things, but he likes to think his own tells a lot about him. Rattling, beat to hell, more miles on it than what’s reasonable. “You could stand to lose _some_ muscle.”

 

He thinks that’s going to be goodbye, but Leakee just dives into one of the bags and fishes out a burrito that he tosses to Mox before pulling out one of the chicken salads, _no guac, sour cream, or ranch_ , as Mox had to force out of his mouth to order. Thing looks dry and disgusting; he doesn’t need to have a body like Leakee’s if that’s the price he’ll have to pay. He looks down at his own chicken burrito in confusion — he didn’t order anything after Leakee rattled off his extensive list — before he shrugs to himself and unwraps it to dig in.

 

“I’m good with how I look, thanks,” Leakee snorts. Mox watches him take a few bites. He should be ashamed. Anyone who eats fast food with a fork needs to reevaluate their life and their choices, he thinks. Then again, Leakee must not be too terribly concerned with that if he’s sitting here, hanging out with Mox. “What’s next for you?”

 

The question takes him aback; he was mostly expecting Leakee to eat in silence. “Decide when I get there,” Mox says around a mouthful of bean and tortilla. Leakee looks disapproving, and Mox smiles widely at him, just barely keeping some of the food from spilling out.

 

“You have _negative_ amounts of class,” Leakee shakes his head, looking deeply put upon, and Mox nearly chokes on his laugh as he’s swallowing. “I can actually feel you sucking whatever’s left of mine out of me.” He stabs the last bit of chicken and lettuce in the bowl, chews and swallows it down, then takes out another and opens it.

 

Mox wants to poke at that until he gets some kind of backlash, ask what he’s still doing here, then, but he remembers how he felt earlier when Leakee had done something similar to him, and he wonders if Leakee doesn’t have his own words held back, if he’s struggling to figure out just what they are, too. And that’s something he would normally love to exploit, but. Leakee’s gotten a lot better at seeing through him, and he’s more concerned with what he wouldn’t be saying by antagonizing him, what Leakee would read between the lines.

 

“Yeah, well, m’a regular black hole, just like you. I suck all the class, you suck all the cocks.” He takes another bite, far too big for his mouth, but actually chews and swallows it completely before talking again, Leakee shaking his head at him. “So, uh,” he wracks his brain for a second, tries to choose a single thing to ask Leakee more about out of a vast sea of ideas. “You have, like, any more games coming up?”

 

“Nah,” Leakee answers, halfway through this salad already, too. Guy knows how to put food away. He’d have to, if he eats like this three times a day. “Last one was Monday. College career is officially over, now.” And Mox doesn’t know a lot about college football — college _anything_ , to be honest — but he knows New Year’s Day games are Bowl games, which is something significant.

 

“So your team was good?”

 

“Not good enough, apparently,” Leakee says dryly, but doesn’t offer any more than that. He doesn’t talk much for someone who never seems to shut up, but he doesn’t throw words away, doesn’t waste them, that way. Mox has no way of knowing how honest he is, really, only his street smarts to rely on for that, but he seems to mean a lot of what he says, and that goes pretty far, for him. Mox can’t say that for most people he associates with.

 

He throws his balled up wrapper into the one bag they’ve emptied, between the two of them. Leakee reaches as if to grab him something else, but Mox shakes his head. He suddenly doesn’t feel very hungry.

 

“You have a match, next week?” Leakee asks, throwing away another empty container, and Mox snorts, because he doesn’t even know what he’s doing later in the day, let alone then.

 

“Not the champion anymore, so who knows. I’ll be around either way, though. Gotta be willing to make some noise, get some dirt under your nails.” Get back what rightfully belongs to him. Leakee hums a little under his breath. “What?”

 

“Nothing,” Leakee says, though Mox likes to think he looks thoughtful. “Just got another meeting in town, then.”

 

Oh. Oh. “Oh, you do, do you.” Mox wants to kick himself, that those are the only words he can come up with. That he’s not tearing into Leakee for this, right now, for what he’s suggesting.

 

“Yeah,” he licks his lips, real quick, and Mox’s eyes follow his tongue. He needs more information than he has, wonders whether that’s one of his tells. “Just, wondering if there would be anything I’d regret missing, if I didn’t show up.”

 

“Don’t exactly require too much persuasion to cause a scene.” Mox allows. He can’t believe he’s agreeing to this. He cannot believe this is a thing that is happening. His head is spinning and the tight space smells like shitty Mexican food and sweat and the slightest trace of sex. Heat is blasting in around them and makes it even worse. “What d’you think? You show up and we’ll do a repeat of this morning, right in the center of the ring, think that would be pretty hard to—”

 

Leakee actually slaps a hand over his mouth, but Mox keeps talking, muffled as it is, before he manages to bite the side of it and he pulls it back. “You talk too damn much,” Leakee scowls at him, but he doesn’t move any further away. “Someday you’re gonna say the wrong thing to the wrong person and get the shit kicked out of you.”

 

Mox grins at that, slides even closer in the space of the car, leaning over the center partition dividing them. “Eh, that day’s not gonna be today, so I’m not too worried about it.” He kisses Leakee, then, sinks into him and pushes, demanding. Mox wants more of him, more of the way his hands are always sure on Mox’s body, more of the way he’s not afraid to throw Mox around, pull his hair and bite his neck and pin him down. When they break apart, he pats Leakee’s head a couple times, then presses a wet kiss to his cheek which he quickly wipes off with a scowl. Tradition, of sorts.

 

“Maybe I’ll see you around, then,” he says, then coughs, glances away to the left of Leakee’s shoulder for a second, teeth clenched. This is _painful_. What the _fuck_. “Now get the fuck outta my car.”

 

Leakee just kind of laughs, grabs the other bag of food and slams the door behind him. Mox stares at the steering wheel in front of him until he hears the other car start, and after that just to be safe. Wonders what just happened for what feels like the hundredth time, today.

 

They have plans, now, him and Leakee. This isn’t ‘see you in a week so my brother can beat your ass’, it’s ‘see you in a week so I don’t have to beat off to the memory of your ass’. He’s never done anything like this with anyone, never had anyone he’s sure he’d still be willing to fuck in a week’s time, but Leakee certainly hasn’t lost his appeal any.

 

Leakee is breaking an awful lot of rules, and doesn’t seem to care. Mox watches him drive away, that silver Jetta blending into the sea of other cars disappearing into the distance. The dashboard clock says 11:39, now; despite himself, in the privacy of his own head, he thinks, _six days_.

 

—

 

It’s Tuesday. Which doesn’t mean anything other than a taping of Adrenaline, tonight, and if Mox catches the hint of upturned lips in the mirror while he’s shaving, he straightens them right away, even if it’s only excitement for a forthcoming match. Can’t fucking shave with a grin on his face, anyway, unless he wants cuts everywhere.

 

On the way to the arena, cigarette hanging out the open window and his hand freezing in the icy twenty degree wind that’s seeping in, he glances in the rearview at the motherfucker who’s following him so closely that he can’t see the headlights, so close he might as well be up Mox’s ass, and he gets distracted by his own eyes in the reflection, the squint of them, the slight wrinkles at the edges, the tops of his cheeks pushing them up. He immediately snaps them wide open.

 

In the locker room, the one Mox really fucking wishes he didn’t share with everyone else right now, some nondescript voice calls out, “Why you looking so happy to get your ass kicked again, Moxley?” and he’s not sure who said it or what they’re on about but he pulls his gear on, hoodie still covering his top half, because it would apparently bankrupt someone to heat this damn building. Everyone else slowly filters in and out of the room, some taunting, ribbing him, but most paying him no mind, and that’s the way Mox prefers it, really. They can go on being high and mighty, above him and his presumably oversized ego, but he’s the one who’ll be number one contender, again, and that belt is as good as his when it happens.

 

It’s only six thirty but he’s full of jitters, hands needing to tap against every damn surface and seemingly unsatisfied with every sound they get in return. His legs feel like they’re crawling, like they’re trying to turn themselves backwards, so he starts roaming the hallways, trying not to look for anything in particular.

 

Then, Mox turns the corner, and he can’t ignore the smile that spreads across his face anymore.

 

There’s something about Leakee that he _likes_ , when he’s feeling honest enough to admit it. Something other than the magnetic attraction, something that has him _choosing_ to keep coming back. Mox can’t put his finger on what, exactly; seems like it changes whenever he tries. Sometimes, Leakee will be particularly abrasive and stinging, and Mox hates that, hates when his voice is more like salt in a wound than a gentle dig. But then, his next words will negate that, and Mox hates that, too, the ease with which Leakee can turn his mood around. His opinions matter, and Mox really fucking hates that, most of all, because he doesn't know _why_.

 

“What did you do?” is how Leakee greets him, eyebrow raised and ever present grimace twisting his lips. Mox isn’t sure what he means, because for once, he’s done absolutely nothing to garner suspicion, but his confusion must show on his face because before he can even say another word, Leakee is answering the unspoken question. “You look like the cat that ate the canary.”

 

Mox wrinkles his nose at that, screws up his face. “That’s the stupidest expression I’ve ever heard. Also, you’re perpetrating sick lies about a completely innocent man, and I won’t stand for it.”

 

The corner of Leakee’s mouth twitches. Mox has gotten used to this smile, the barely there one, the one that sometimes means he’s trying to force it back, sometimes means he’s smug. This one seems a little more like the former. “The concepts of innocent and you don’t belong in the same sentence. I’m sure you did something to earn my suspicion.”

 

“You’re just full of flattery, tonight.” He glances down the otherwise empty hallway, all the wrestlers gathered in the locker room or around Gorilla, all the bystanders taking their seats. “No wonder you’re beatin’ everyone off with sticks.”

 

“Don’t give me any ideas.” His lips pull up even further, and Mox kind of delights in that, that he knew what Leakee’s face was trying to do before it did. He’s not sure if Leakee was referring to it in the way that Mox did or if he was trying to turn it into an innuendo, but he doesn’t take the former too seriously. Either way, he could probably make it something kinky. “What’s the plan, tonight?”

 

Mox doesn’t know what he means, at first, nearly narrows his eyes and tells him _what do you think, you’re fucking me through the mattress_ , but Leakee’s gaze is hovering around his knee pads and he recognizes the question being asked. “Don’t have much of a plan. Got two fists and more wrestling knowledge than anyone else in this building, and I’m gonna beat down whoever they throw at me until I get my rematch.”

 

Leakee rolls his eyes and Mox watches the way they travel, how they stop to rest on his own, again. “That sounds about right, I guess. Swing first, ask questions later. At least make it entertaining.”

 

“Oh, don’t you worry,” Mox tells him, stepping forward just enough to tap the end of his nose. The look on Leakee’s face, torn between confusion and exasperation, eggs him on. “I’ll whip out something real special for you.” Now, Leakee just looks disgusted.

 

“Keep your damn trunks on.”

 

Mox laughs at that, and it echoes, filling up both his mouth and the hallway. He skips a few steps backwards, gives a little wave of his hand. “Won’t make promises I can’t keep.”

 

He actually, fuck, he’s actually looking forward to after his match more than he is the actual thing, and, when he lines up across the ring from some new, nameless face he’s barely seen around before, Mox can’t think of another time that’s ever been true. It probably doesn’t help that the match itself isn’t too engaging, at the start. Not a lot of fight in the other guy, at first, but Mox slaps him across the face and dances away, repeatedly, over and over, until his opponent doesn’t let him get away, grabs him and swings and, _yes_ , they’re finally _getting_ somewhere. He gives Mox a battle, then, a challenge; there’s a bed of embers under his skin and they all erupt into flames at that first strike. They dance back and forth, each of them hitting fairly devastating moves on the other; Mox is pretty sure he’s going to wake up with a bruise extending the entire right side of his rib cage, tomorrow. Then, there’s a mistake, only this week, it isn’t Mox’s, and he sees an opening, suddenly remembers what he told Leakee.

 

He tries something new, then: wraps both of the guy’s arms behind his back, pulling them tight and lifting him off the ground, then falls into a sitting position and smashes his face into the mat. His opponent doesn’t so much as twitch when he goes for a cover, lazily covering the body under him until the ref’s hand hits the mat for a third time and the bell rings.

 

He never gets tired of his hand being raised, the sound of his name being announced. It’s as good as any dirty talk he’s ever heard, fuels the fire racing through him, made all the better by the fact that Mox knows this particular ref can’t stand him. He makes him lift his arm again, tells him it wasn’t long enough, the first time.

 

By the time he wraps up his in-ring celebration and rolls out of the ring, the roar of those flames the only thing in his head, that he can hear at all, Leakee is already waiting for him outside the locker room, and Mox needs to touch him because he’s on fire, wants Leakee to feel it, too.

 

Mox grabs him, one hand in his hair and one on his shoulder, and crushes their lips together, tries to breathe the sparks on his tongue into Leakee’s mouth.

 

“What’s gotten into you,” Leakee gasps — actually gasps, winded, Mox is stealing the breath right out of his lungs — between Mox’s assault on his mouth.

 

“I love victory,” he says, enough an explanation as anything, grabbing at whatever part of Leakee he can reach. It’s his shoulder, a hand skimming his waist, one pushing his shirt up just enough to connect with warm skin.

 

Mox makes a sound that he will deny to his grave when Leakee pushes him back enough for him to look at Mox, take in his wild eyes and flushed face, red from exertion and blazing from that heat. He just stops, for a minute, staring at Mox, who stares right back, growing impatient. “Yeah. I guess it looks pretty good on you.”

 

His hands drop from Mox’s shoulders, then, and Mox is dragging his mouth over a pulse point, now, can feel the heartbeat under his tongue. “Everything looks better off of me,” he tells Leakee; he wants to be home, now, but he can’t be, doesn’t think he can wait. He thinks he might have been hard since he was leaving the ring, and it doesn’t even remotely matter if anyone saw. “I’ll show you. Fuck me, right now. I’ll show you.”

 

“I’m not fucking you here,” Leakee says, though Mox knows he could break that resolve if he just gets a little longer to try — there’s the showers, the bathrooms, wherever he wants; it wasn’t below Leakee in the past — and a roll of his hips into Leakee’s is a good start, but the other man breaks them apart again before Moxley can push him further. “I’m not. Get your shit together and I’ll meet you at your place.”

 

It’s a bucket of cold water dousing him, that heat dying out and his hardon flagging, but Mox just shoots him a dirty look and complies, going to gather his stuff and muttering to himself the entire time. He makes record time back to the apartment, either way, and Leakee is waiting on him by the time he gets there, as promised. The impatient glare he shoots Mox when he steps out of the car reignites whatever was burning in him before, and Mox pulls him in through the front door by his coat.

 

Winter is really a terrible season; too many layers to shed, it takes too long to get to skin on skin, and he’s not sure that he didn’t rip Leakee’s shirt in the process of tearing it off of him. His mouth is moving so fast, biting and sucking and kissing whatever he can reach, and everything is in technicolor, so vivid that Mox sees it even when he closes his eyes.

 

He tries to get Leakee to fuck him right up against the wall, fast and rough, face pressed against the uneven pattern of it, stamping lines into his cheek, but Leakee pushes him down onto the bed, instead, keeps them face to face.

 

“Victory does look damn good on you,” he says by way of explanation when Mox opens his mouth to protest, and the complaints die on his tongue. He still feels hot, all over, those flames fanning again, and Leakee’s words just add fuel to the fire. Mox isn’t sure he’s ever heard that kind of compliment from Leakee before, and he wants to remember it, even if it is just him talking with his dick.

 

Soon enough, Leakee is buried in him, rocking forcefully and touching roughly and everything dirty, everything that Mox likes, but it’s not enough, he wants more, wants all that Leakee can give him, wants that fire smothered just enough so he can feel everything that much more. “That all you got?” he asks, still burning up. “That’s pathetic, that’s fucking weak.” His breaths are a little labored, and become even more so when Leakee growls and starts thrusting harder, but that’s still not what Mox is looking for, it’s not what he needs. “C’mon, I said fucking _give it to me_ , are you stupid or are you just not fucking listening?”

 

“What more do you want, asshole,” Leakee gripes, keeping up an impressive rhythm, and Mox bites down hard because it’s so good, but it’s just not good enough. “Shut up.”

 

Mox makes sure his eyes are wide open, stares right into Leakee’s, and forces the words out through clenched teeth. “Make. Me.”

 

He can see the spark, then, the exact instant when Leakee realizes what he’s doing a shitty job of asking for, and there’s a moment’s hesitation before one of his hands is gripping around Mox’s throat, pressing down and in and tight, tight, tight until the air he’s trying to draw in through his nose has nowhere to go.

 

The lack of oxygen starts snuffing out the fire, and what’s left in its wake is the burning sensation in his limbs, in his lungs, and he can feel Leakee, feel his cock and his hands everywhere, even where he knows they’re not, and that hand begins to loosen a little so he puts his own on top of it to keep it in place and he can feel his own hands on him, too, and the sensation of them on his sides and his arms and running over his legs is so soothing, and then there are more hands stroking his cock, everything, everything is everywhere and he thinks he can see it all, the pleasure building in his stomach is cool and relaxed and when he comes he sees white, clean, clear.

 

There’s so much sensation in his limbs that it hurts Mox to move much, after, so he just lies and watches Leakee coming down, matches the long drags of breath in to his. Someday, he thinks, someday Mox is gonna find the wrong person to do this with, one who won’t know the right time to let go, and that’s fine by him, that’s a way he could stand to die, but somehow he knows that Leakee would get it right, if he ever asked again.

 

In the bathroom, cleaning up, he takes a close look in the mirror, and if Mox was expecting purple marks around his neck, he’s a little disappointed.

 

Nothing was blurry, before, but it all seems to come back into perfect focus when he steps out of the bathroom, again. Leakee is half dressed, pants pulled on, looking at the bookshelf next to the TV, fingers running over the few DVD titles there, and he doesn’t look properly chagrined when he turns to find Mox scowling at him. Nosy motherfucker. “This all you’ve got to entertain yourself with?” he asks, eyebrow raised. “A few wrestling matches and...Point Break? Really?”

 

“Fuck you. What more do I need?” Mox asks him, accusingly, scratching at his stomach as he flops onto the bed. Leakee eyes him from across the room, stretched out boneless and naked on top of the covers, and Mox thinks he could stand to go for round two, slides his palm down his abdomen and stops above his cock, gives himself a little time to consider. Leakee’s eyes flare with heat again, and isn’t that why they’re both here, anyway? “My own company is engrossing and enjoyable as is. And Point Break is the greatest movie of all time. Patrick Swayze is a god among men.”

 

His voice is rough, and Leakee looks like he feels a certain way about the sound of it, though Mox can’t tell what it is. And then he forgets to be worried about it, because, well. “Never actually seen it.” Leakee drops that fucking bomb on him. It takes a minute to process the words, because they make no sense in connection with what he’s heard in the conversation up to this point. Mox’s whole body physically jerks in rejection of the statement, because how — what — how the fuck is something like that even possible, it’s not, it’s a lie or the human race is slowly being infiltrated with imposters and Leakee is one of them, lifelike robots who seem real enough but break down under scrutiny. Mox narrows his eyes at Leakee — he certainly fucks like a machine.

 

“What the fuck is wrong with you? Get outta here, I can’t even look at you right now, get the fuck out of my sight.” Leakee grins like mortally offending Mox in his own home is something he should be proud of, and he looks so happy about it that Mox cannot let it stand. “You know what, no, put that shit in, sit your ass down, you can leave after you’ve learned a thing or two.” Leakee actually listens to him, even if he’s shaking his head as he does it, and Mox shimmies under the covers when he slides up onto the bed next to him. “Don’t even touch me, I’m so fuckin’ disgusted right now, you have no idea. Go sit on the floor.”

 

He doesn’t listen to that, though, stays spread out over the covers next to Mox, who kicks at him in a less than half-hearted attempt to knock him off the bed. Leakee has to comment on everything that’s happening, on screen, because he doesn’t know how to exist without being the most aggravating thing in any space he occupies. The two of them spend more time arguing over the dialogue than watching the movie, and when Keanu Reeves announces that he is an FBI agent, Leakee bursts into laughter. Mox is torn between being insulted and amused, himself, but ends up laughing along with him. When Johnny Utah walks off screen, dramatically, soaking wet and waves crashing behind him, Leakee turns to him and blinks twice. “You should be ashamed of yourself. That was two hours of my life I can never have back.”

 

“Get out of here. No one asked you to stay,” Mox pushes at him, and Leakee grins again.

 

“Didn’t you?” he asks, and Mox refuses to let Leakee see him flounder when he realizes that, yeah, he did. And that he had a damn good time, all things considered. Leakee is getting up already, though, pulling on the rest of his clothes — his shirt tear free, Mox is both relieved and disappointed to find — and he doesn’t notice anything that might slip through to Mox’s face. A minute later, he’s heading towards the door, before he turns back to look at Mox. “What? No parting one-liner? No sloppy goodbye kiss?”

 

Mox stares at him standing next to the door, and his mouth is opening, and he nearly finds himself asking Leakee to put in one of the wrestling DVDs, keep watching with him, but that would be ridiculous and he doesn’t know why he’d say that so what he says instead is, “No farewell handjob? No adios blow?” with a thrust of his hips upward. Leakee flips him off, and Mox gives a quiet laugh, jumps up out of the bed to stroll over, still bareass naked.

 

“Yeah, I know, looks like a real tempting offer, don’t it,” he drawls at Leakee’s wandering eyes. “Too bad for you it's off the table, now.” He does try to land a kiss on Leakee's cheek, since he asked so nicely, but he turns his head to the side at the last moment and catches Mox’s mouth with his own.

 

It’s a short thing, just a press of lips together, over and done with before he knows it, just like it would have been had it reached Leakee’s cheek like he intended. It’s a short, nothing, throwaway thing, so when his entire body hums for a second, afterward, it’s obviously unrelated. Leakee is looking at him with that smug smile, though, that one reserved for when he believes he’s won, and Mox thinks he maybe missed something because he certainly doesn’t feel like he lost at any point, tonight.

 

“Vaya con Dios,” he says, in a decent impression if he says so himself, and Leakee laughs, shaking his head. There’s one of those things Mox likes, that laugh, wishes he could hear it more often if for no other reason than to keep the more mean-spirited ones at bay. Leakee opens the door, backing out while apparently completely unconcerned with gracing any unsuspecting passerby with the glory of Mox’s body. He thinks maybe Leakee is a little more voyeuristic than he’s letting on. Mox makes a mental note to test that, somehow, next time.

 

“A pleasure, as always,” Leakee says, voice coated with just enough sarcasm to make Mox question whether he means it or not. Which doesn’t matter, regardless, even if he is still just standing right outside the doorway, doing a damn good job of looking only at Mox’s face.

 

“There you go, getting all cocky, expecting you’ll just get pleasured every time. Don’t think I won’t turn you down, that I can’t find better holes to stick my dick in anywhere around town.”

 

Leakee’s mouth twitches, again, and Mox is finally starting to freeze in place from the air blowing in. “Somehow, I think I’ll live.”

 

He finally walks away, after that, and Mox slams the door shut, shivering in the entrance to his apartment, something about those last words really getting to him. He collapses in bed, again, burying himself under the sheets. He’s not sure whether they were a dig, or maybe a challenge.

  
He’s not sure about a lot of things about Leakee that he thought he knew.


	6. shut your mouth and see straight through me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with me through this meandering story. There is an endgame we are heading towards, I promise. I don't know when the next chapter will be posted; the holiday season is here, and I am out of town for most of it, and the first week of January as well. So, be prepared for a wait of a month or more, this time.

Time moves too slowly and too quickly all at once. Mox blinks and it’s February, a month without his title and a month without Leakee, and one is far more significant than the other, but they’re still the best points by which to measure how fast life is going on around him. Days can kind of blend into each other, if Mox isn’t careful, and that’s not really something he knows how to be. A lot can change, even when not much has changed at all, because he’s made no headway in HWA to speak of, but IPW is considering opening its doors to him and Mox is planning on kicking them down.

 

That’s where he is now, Indianapolis, climbing into a ring that he’s never been in before, but they’re all the same where it counts and they all belong to him, anyway.

 

He normally pays little attention to the crowd, and this occasion is no different. Or, as his eyes quickly scan the audience, more to take in the building itself than the faces staring at him, it shouldn’t be. There are a few slightly recognizable people, fans who show up at any matches in the general vicinity, a couple that Mox is sure actually follow him around. But there’s — there’s a familiar face that his eyes snap back to, one he was never expecting to see, and Leakee gives a smirk and a sarcastic little wave as Mox’s mouth falls open. He’s gonna take that hand and shove the whole thing down Leakee’s throat.

 

The bell rings, then, without his eyes on his opponent, and Mox starts at a disadvantage, missing the lockup and being forced back into the corner to start out. He takes several blows to the face and chest before he’s able to strike back with a chop, knocking the guy several paces back for a few seconds. Mox has a couple inches and a few pounds on him, but that doesn’t seem to make much of a difference; he’s able to push him around, sure, but the guy keeps springing back up and coming at him, and if there’s something Mox can’t stand, it’s someone who doesn’t know when they need to stay down.

 

He kicks the feet out from under him, swings wildly, hits a suplex that Leakee better cry golden tears over later, it was that fucking beautiful, but it’s all apparently not enough. Mox ends up pinned in the center of the ring, effectively losing his debut match in IPW, and to say it’s not exactly the way he was hoping to make a first impression would be the fucking understatement of the year.

 

He freaks out, a little. Maybe a lot, who knows. His hands find the top rope and start shaking it wildly, curses that don’t even make sense in his own head spilling out of his mouth, before he drops to his knees and starts pummeling the mat underneath him out of sheer frustration more than anything. It’s been a month now since he lost his title and he still hasn't had an opportunity to reclaim it, and this is his third loss since then, with only one win, and Leakee is probably laughing at him right now and is actively trying to ruin his fucking life.

 

All because conclusions he thought he had reached are quickly turning back into more questions, and, well. Mox has never known what to do with himself when he doesn’t have all the answers.

Leakee is waiting for him near the exit, after he’s changed, already wrapped up in a thick coat, and there’s a heavy stormcloud following Mox now, but something about the light shining down on Leakee, it reminds him of the first time he ever saw him, half-drunk and a little high and thinking it was Leakee himself that was so bright. He’s always doing this, despite telling himself repeatedly not to, keeps getting caught up in thoughts that Leakee is more than he’s shown himself to be, that maybe there’s not a blackness in his heart mirroring Mox’s own, but then shit like this happens and his motivations are suspect at best.

 

“Did you just fuckin’ do that?” he yells out, pushes at Leakee’s shoulder to knock him into the wall. Mox caught him off guard, which is a little strange to think about, provided that Leakee certainly saw him coming. He had to have known that Mox would be pissed. “Did you just show up in some convoluted plan to try and cost me my match?”

 

Leakee has that face on, now, the one Mox hates most, like he’s looking down at him even though they’re the same height. “Not even a hello? I waved, at least.”

 

His head is going to fucking explode. Mox’s jaw clenches furiously, trying to rein in the expanding fury. He’s breathing heavily through his nose, and Leakee’s watching him like he’s the most interesting thing in the room, which is true, to say the least, but this is not a goddamn zoo and his life is not for Leakee to show up and gawk at, waving sticks between the bars to see if Mox will bite.

 

“Did you,” he says, trying to force his voice to be quieter and an octave lower than normal — it doesn’t work, still comes out high pitched and loud, so loud, “come here to try and distract me during my first fuckin’ match with this company?”

 

There’s a short pause between them, short, angry breaths huffing out on his end, and Leakee silent on the other, before the corner of his mouth lifts just a bit. Mox already knows he’s not going to like the words that come out, he can just tell. “Why? Did it work?”

 

Flames. Mox is seeing nothing but hot red flames on the side of his face. Somewhere, inside of his incensed brain, he thinks maybe he’s aware that this is not a serious response, but this isn’t a fucking game and he’s not playing around. “You really think you’d be any sort of distraction to me? That you could shake my focus and keep me from doing what I came here to do?”

 

“What I really think,” Leakee answers, “is that you should tell me. You’re the one acting like I couldn’t possibly be, yet expecting me to apologize for it.” He actually looks a little offended by the idea. Mox glowers at him, just makes the most discouraging face he can imagine. Leakee’s eyes narrow at him in response, and Mox readies himself for this to become an all out fight. His fist has been itching to take a swing at Leakee since that first flash of smirk. “Contrary to your paranoid belief that I’m out to ruin your excuse for a life or whatever, I actually don’t enjoy seeing you lose matches all that much.”

 

That gives Mox pause. It’s not really anything he’d been expecting to hear come out of Leakee’s mouth, ever. And he would doubt the truthfulness of the words, but they still, god damn it, they still sound so sincere, and Mox wishes that didn't mean a thing to him, but it does. He wants a lie from Leakee, a stretch of the truth, wants a basis for comparison as proof that his bullshitometer isn’t shot to hell.

 

“You don't, huh,” he echoes, and it doesn't come out as angry or as questioning as he would have liked.

 

“No one would if they were the one who had to deal with you after.” Leakee doesn't have a trace of that amusement that was hanging around his mouth, earlier — Mox spends so much of their time together trying to wipe smirks off of his face that he’s pretty sure it should feel better than it does.

 

“Fuck you, I’m a delight,” he shoots back, and Leakee doesn’t smile again but he does snort out a laugh that he looks a bit taken aback by and Mox is satisfied with that.

 

“You’re the bane of the earth’s existence, and I am not putting up with that shit tonight.” Leakee crosses his arms and pushes away from the wall, standing toe to toe with him. He’s taller than Mox remembers, doesn’t know how he could forget that, every time. “Didn’t come here to deal with you causing me a load of misery.”

 

Mox grins at the words, like a stinging slap across his face, in the nicest way. “Put up or shut up, sunshine,” he sings, backing away, his head tilting far to one side before he does a fluid spin in the other direction. “Both know why you’re here.”

 

He walks slowly away, trying not to glance behind him to see if the other man is following. He wants to say it’s definitely not an invitation when he lingers by his car in the lightly falling snow — that if Leakee comes along, that’s all him — but that’s a lie. But Mox is definitely not disappointed when the man climbs into another car, starting it before he's even gotten into his. It's good riddance, is what it is, he sniffs to himself as he turns the engine over and starts heading for the hotel room to call it an early night. There's no one else here he's particularly familiar with, and drinking alone doesn't sound very cathartic, either.

 

His hair is a little wet from standing out in the steadily increasing snowfall, as is the thin hoodie he’s been keeping as the only barrier between him and the cold, this winter. Leakee’s sudden turn around, his barebones interaction with Mox tonight, is eating at him in the strangest way, and that doesn’t help Mox feel any warmer. It’s what he’s always asking for, him to shut his mouth and get to walking, so Mox is having a little trouble grasping why the end result isn’t the one he thought he wanted.

 

He likes the way Leakee pops up, unexpected, likes how it keeps him on his toes, anticipates his arrival when it feels like it’s been a long time since he’s last laid eyes on the other man. What’s harder to get used to, to come to terms with, is being completely and utterly annoyed and sick of someone and not immediately wanting to replace them, hoping that they’ll come around anyway. Mox isn’t in the habit of denying himself things he wants, and for some godforsaken reason, his body wants Leakee’s. Everything else is a bitter pill to swallow, but, he supposes he’s adjusting, that he’ll do it. It’s extremely pathetic, but he’d do it for that dick.

 

Headlights follow him into the parking lot, and Mox growls at how close they get, bares his teeth at the driver made invisible by the glare. When he parks and gets out, ignoring the idiot taking the space next to him, room key in his hand, it’s Leakee that is getting out of his own car, and something starts happening to Mox’s stomach, like a million punches being landed there in rapid fire succession, except, except from the inside. “I don’t recall you driving like a complete jackass, before,” Leakee states, and Mox really wishes he would have chosen something less completely goddamn stupid to say so he could focus on his breathing and the sick feeling beating his middle into the ground.

 

“You’re one to fuckin’ talk,” Mox tells him, because if he doesn’t he thinks he might say something more embarrassing instead, might admit to the weird thrill he gets seeing Leakee here in a place that belongs to neither of them, where they might as well be on even ground. “Were you trying to blind me with your damn headlights? Because, let me tell you, if I can’t lay eyes on you, that’s at least eighty percent of your appeal, gone like that.”

 

“Charming.” Leakee seems to have found that slightly better mood again, following closely behind Mox as he leads the way to his door, opening it for the both of them. They both know what comes next, at least, and that’s brightening Mox’s spirits considerably as well. A good fuck works wonders for a post-loss funk, he’s found; doesn’t cure it, obviously, but it helps to lose himself in a redirection of that anger, and Leakee is, if nothing else, a good fuck. He is also glancing around the room with quick flicks of his eyes, a disgusted curl to his lips. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think I prefer your place. Your choice in hotels is abhorrent.” He takes a seat on one of the beds, anyway, and Mox smirks at him from across the short distance between them, leaning back against the desk, hands braced on top of it. Kicks off his shoes and maneuvers his socks off, too, while he’s at it.

 

“You know,” he says, letting his eyes trail over the clothed expanse of Leakee’s body, as the other man pushes his coat off and it falls onto the mattress behind him, ignoring the way he’s trying to start shit with Mox. Mox is the only one starting anything around here. “I was just thinkin’. You already got an eyeful, earlier, when I was in the ring. Would only be polite to return the favor.”

 

“Return the favor?” Leakee repeats, incredulous, the words sounding like a dirty curse in his mouth. Mox grins, big and bright, strolls over nice and slow. He runs a single finger down the center of Leakee’s chest, watches as he fights an internal struggle between staying in place and moving away. That finger reaches for the hem of his shirt, traces a small strip of skin underneath it. Leakee shudders, just a little bit. Mox’s hand is cold, but, god, he hopes it isn’t because of that.

 

“Yeah. Strip.”

 

Leakee scowls, shrugs the jacket he still has on off his shoulders and starts pulling at his shirt, defiant look in his eyes all the way, but Mox isn’t satisfied unless he’s pushing him to his limits. “Not like that, Jesus Christ, I coulda done that to you myself.” He backs up to the desk, again, sitting on his hands to make sure they stay occupied and away from other things, for now, his cock starting to strain against his jeans. “C’mon. Gimme a show.”

 

There’s a long moment where they’re both just blinking at each other. Leakee finally laughs, this dark chuckle that’s less amused and more contemplating horrible things he could be doing to Mox, and that’s so damn hot that Mox nearly groans out loud. “You’re more the one to get off on inappropriate behavior, I think.”

 

“S’ hardly inappropriate between the two of us. Nothing I haven’t seen before.” His fingers are curling underneath him, dying to be wrapped around his cock and start stroking. “Commonplace, really. Gotta keep my interest somehow.”

 

“Right. That’s why you’re staring at me, ready to come in your pants like a teenager.” And, look, Mox can mock his body all he wants, obviously Leakee knows by now it’s a stretch of the truth, at best, but when his sexual prowess is called into question, well, that’s just ridiculous and Leakee knows it. They match up with each other pretty well, in that regard. Ridiculing Mox is essentially insulting himself. His scoff lets Leakee know all that and more.

 

Leakee actually makes an attempt, if it could be called that, smoothly sliding his shirt over his head, but he looks gloomy. It's baffling how someone who looks like him can make a strip tease so tragic. He thinks they would both be enjoying this better if roles were reversed.

 

“Stop, just stop, I’ll put you out of your misery. Show you how it’s done.” Mox pulls the sweatshirt he still has on over his head, gets that awkward movement out of the way immediately, before meeting Leakee’s stare. The other man’s chest is something anyone could get hard over, and it would be easy to let his gaze wander down there, but Mox has always been a whore for eyes all over him, and Leakee isn’t letting him down any.

 

He starts by trailing a hand down his torso, running his palm firmly over what’s now become a prominent bulge in his pants before pushing his shirt up just enough to rub at the skin just above his waistband. He brings his other hand down, pulling the fabric up little by little, revealing one line of abdominal muscles at a time. Mox runs fingernails over each one, hissing a little at the feeling of his own hand. When he reaches his chest, he slides a thumb into his mouth, wetting it with his tongue before removing it and letting it trail over one nipple.

 

Leakee looks like turning away isn’t something he’d even be capable of.

 

Mox’s hips have started rocking gently forward and back at some point, looking for friction that he’s not ready to give quite yet, and he slides his t-shirt over his head a little too quick for what the rest of his movements have been, but he’s missing precious seconds of those eyes on him. His body is warming up in the cool room — the outside air is still lingering from their entrance, but trails of heat are igniting everywhere Leakee looks.

 

His hands fall to the buckle of his belt, pull the extra length of it back and out, undoing it along with the button of his jeans. His hands pull the zipper down on autopilot, letting the pants fall around his feet, leaving him in nothing but his black briefs. Across the room, Leakee licks his lips, and there’s a buzzing in the base of Mox’s skull. He’s on fire, just like the last time he rolled out of the ring with his name echoing through the speakers, and it’s been so long he nearly forgot what it felt like. He’s never found it anywhere else, not like this, and his head is spinning and he feels dizzy and he had been trying to concentrate on the feel of his own hands on his skin but he just wants to feel Leakee’s on him, now.

 

That’s what he’s imagining, dipping two fingers under the waistband, fingernails scratching again as he pulls them back out. He runs a hand over his hip bone, tracing the jut of it, and pretends it’s Leakee’s. Mox thinks he’s moaning, because he hears something and Leakee’s mouth isn’t moving, but it doesn’t sound anything like him. Finally, _finally_ , he can’t imagine doing anything other than pushing his underwear down enough to free his cock, and he starts stroking it as slow as he can stand, hips still moving beyond his control. His head tips back, eyes rolling in their sockets before they close, and something in him hates breaking that eye contact with Leakee, even if he knows he’s still watching every move Mox makes.

 

“Fuck,” and that’s Leakee this time, for sure, but it doesn’t sound anything like him, either, breathless and nearly distressed. There’s a rustling of sheets, heavy paces of him moving across the floor, but Mox can barely hear any of it over his own increasing gasps. A hand covers his own, then, moving along with it for a few seconds before chasing it away, and that’s everything his body’s been screaming for, the unpredictability of someone else touching him.

 

Another hand rests at the base of his exposed throat, and Mox swallows heavily at the memory of the last time they were together. He manages to bring his head back to watch Leakee’s face in front of him. He forgot, _holy shit_ , he forgot how good Leakee’s hand feels wrapped around his dick when he’s not distracted by any other sensations; it may be the thing he’s best at and he’s not exactly lacking in other categories. Mox can feel his toes curling in the carpet, and that’s before Leakee even starts talking.

 

“Can’t ever get enough of being the center of attention, can you. You don’t have to look at yourself like this, it’s terrible.” He’s leaning Mox back over the desk, and their faces have gotten very close. Close enough that Mox can see tiny flecks of green in Leakee’s eyes, and those are not something he ever needed to know were there, but he does, now.

 

“Don’t lie,” he manages to choke out, biting his tongue to distract himself, because he’s not ready to come yet. “Don’t, don’t act like it’s — it’s not the best thing you ever seen, don’t do that.”

 

Leakee scowls, but it looks more like a smile. “Never said it wasn’t, did I?” Shit, it’s one thing for Mox to talk himself up, but Leakee doing the same, agreeing with him, he’s practically preening under the attention. “I think I promised you, once, that I’d make you scream. Bet no one else ever has.” An undignified whimper escapes his mouth at a particularly sweet twist of wrist, but Leakee isn’t finished yet. “You want that? Wanna know what it feels like? Ask me for it. Beg me to fuck you.”

 

God, Mox doesn’t know how it’s possible, his emotions flipping back and forth so fast he can’t keep up. “Kiss me, fuckin’ kiss me you asshole,” is the most he’s going to ask for, pulling Leakee the few inches forward to his mouth. It’s far from the best they’ve ever shared, uncoordinated and frantic, but it grounds him, keeps him in the moment.

 

Leakee backs away then, breaking all contact between their bodies, and Mox starts swearing at him before he realizes he’s dropping his own pants, digging in Mox’s bag for lube. How many times have they done this, that Leakee knows where to find the stuff? He watches every movement through heavy eyes, going with it when Leakee spins his body around.

 

That’s how they fuck, Leakee behind him and Mox bent over the desk, a mirror right in front of his face. Mox watches both of them, the way their mouths move and gasp at different intervals and occasionally at the same time. They look so fucking good, the two of them together, under the dirty yellow light, and when Mox finally comes, something that feels like it’s been drawn out for a fucking hour, now, it’s right after Leakee’s teeth dig into the flesh where his shoulder just begins to meet his neck.

 

This time, looking at his reflection staring back, Mox can see the mark left behind.

 

Mox takes a cigarette break on the landing outside of the room, later, leaning over the side and watching cars pass by on the road. After a few minutes, Leakee joins him, arms resting on the railing. “Got a smoke?” he asks, though Mox has only ever seen him disgusted by the sight and smell before. And he does, still, just got two new packs today, but it’s never fun to do exactly what Leakee expects him to do.

 

He takes a long drag, sucking in all the smoke he can, and grabs Leakee’s coat between both hands, bringing their mouths together while trying to be mindful that he doesn’t set the ends of Leakee’s hair on fire with the cigarette still burning away in his hand. He coaxes Leakee’s lips apart with a press of his tongue, blows that lungful right into his waiting mouth. The air is crisp and difficult to breathe in, when Mox pulls back, but he repeats the action, smoke into his lungs and then into Leakee’s, and when he tries to break away a second time, Leakee grabs him by his hair and turns it into a kiss.

 

It’s nothing more than a lazy drag of lips over each other, his hands fisted in that soft jacket, and then Leakee’s tongue moves against his, some of that smoke curling back into his mouth again, and Mox tastes ash and wonders if maybe this isn’t exactly what Leakee had been expecting when he asked.

 

They stop, finally, when neither can breathe anymore; Mox’s cigarette is burnt low and he’d normally complain about how much nicotine Leakee has cost him over the last year, but as he extinguishes the butt on the rail and tosses it away, it doesn’t seem like a waste. Leakee lingers at his elbow, silent, watching the same cars that Mox’s eyes have returned to.

 

“Guess I should take off,” Leakee finally says, but makes no move to. They’re both just standing out here in sub-freezing temperatures, Mox with his socks on but no shoes, protected by the awning from the falling snow. It’s sickeningly saccharine, the picture they’re probably painting, but Mox just can’t bring himself to care enough to move. “No use in hanging around longer than you’re wanted.”

 

Mox snorts. “Right. Never stopped you before.” Leakee still hasn’t gone anywhere, and his eyes are on Mox, now, just watching. Mox, who is not a fucking mind reader, is understandably annoyed. He leans over, presses a quick kiss to Leakee’s cheek, in case he’s actually waiting for that. When Mox pulls back, he’s pretty sure he catches a flash of amusement in Leakee’s eyes, but it’s gone again at next glance, if it was ever there in the first place. And the man still isn’t going anywhere.

 

There’s really no reason that Mox can come up with for him to be sticking around at this point. Mox is tired and ready to fall into bed and do nothing for awhile, there’s no movie to watch and probably three channels on the tv, and Leakee is already out in the cold, so he can’t be avoiding that, either. There’s just —

 

Does he — is this — does he want to stay just for Mox? Not for his body, but, like, for everything else, for the things he normally turns his nose up at? For all the bullshit that Mox spews and the way things are so easy between them when Leakee isn’t an asshole, when Mox doesn’t think too hard about what he’s doing and who he’s doing it with? Because Mox thinks, now, that his company has never really been the worst in the world, even when he’s near unbearable, but he can’t, he can’t, he just cannot bring himself to say that. Leakee is looking at him like this is some sort of standoff, and Mox stares back with narrowed eyes and refuses to be the one to give in.

 

“Well?” he challenges, eyebrows raised. “You forget stuff inside or how your legs work or somethin’?” Leakee smiles a little, to himself, and Mox is dying to know what’s going through his head but he’s done asking Leakee for anything, tonight.

 

“Nah,” Leakee says, standing up from where he was leaning against the railing, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He’s still loitering, here, but at least there’s forward momentum, which is a start in the right direction, because Mox is not going to ask but if Leakee asks him, he’s not sure he wouldn’t say yes. “You’ll catch a win soon, you know. Then you can stop being such a miserable little bastard.”

 

Mox glares daggers at him. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Seriously. You don’t catch a win, sitting out there waiting to lure it in like it’ll come to you. You smash everything in your path apart until it can’t hide from you anymore, and you take it.” God, the fucking nerve of Leakee, like his opinion on Mox’s record even remotely matters. Like it’s something he should be bringing up. Just when Mox was thinking he wasn’t half bad to stand around with. He should know better, too, than to say shit like that, than to think that’s how it works. Mox starts to fish out another cigarette, stressed and in need of something soothing, but Leakee is nodding, now, and he takes a step to the side.

 

“Guess there’s more than one way to get there,” Leakee is still grinning a little, and it’s good, the way he lights up a little with it, a nice smile on a nice face, but nice things weren’t made for Mox and he doesn’t have much of an affinity for them because of it. He is curious, though, about what it would be like if this one stuck around. "See you around, Jon.”

 

Mox tries to scowl at him, but it takes too much effort, keeping that expression up. He settles on matching Leakee’s expression, seeing if it freaks him out like it is Mox. But he just walks past Mox, heading for the stairs. “Yeah, in your dreams, sweetheart,” he calls out, and Leakee chuckles but doesn’t turn back. Mox lights the cigarette, stands outside and smokes it, watching Leakee get into his car without a glance up at him, driving off into the white backdrop, and he puts the unburnt half out when he disappears, goes back inside.

 

The warmth that filled the room before is nowhere to be found, despite the fact that Mox cranked the heat up to full blast before he went outside and, by the sound of it, it still appears to be working overtime. After dropping his pants once more, he crawls into bed, covers pulled over himself until just his head is sticking out, from his eyes up, and stares at the empty one a few feet away.

 

There’s a lot of vacant space there, he supposes, for a body to occupy, a lot of noise coming from the heater shaking in the wall for a voice to talk over, and he doesn’t regret his decisions, ever, but what would it have hurt, really, if Leakee had asked to stay? Not like they haven’t done it before.

 

He turns onto his back, then, stares at the ceiling so he doesn’t have to look at the empty bed anymore. Mox doesn’t miss something he’s never had or even really wanted but he doesn’t know what else to call this. He sighs loudly, to anyone that might be listening, flings an arm over his eyes, and utterly fails to sleep for the next four hours.

 

—

 

It’s April, before he knows it, and Mox is ready to smash everything in his path. He can’t pick up a fucking win for the life of him, not when it matters; in the span of a month he’s lost no less than three title matches, two of them for his heavyweight title, when he’s squashing everyone else he comes up against with ease. He’ll still get his title back, he’s sure of it, it’s just a matter of time, but Mox is quickly running out of what precious little patience he has. He can beat Brian Jennings, he fucking knows he can, he has before, he's the best and he needs to prove it — he can reach the top of HWA again, and once he does, once that belt is in his hands, he's gonna leave that pathetic excuse for competition behind, keep his prize and never give it up again.

 

Other promotions are more than willing to open their doors, at least, and Mox is finding new people to face inspiring. It’s been so long since he's had to scout anyone, so long since he's faced down anyone he's never wrestled before, and the injection of new blood is a shot right in his veins, adrenaline that amps everything up and makes his frustration that much more overwhelming. But it's something different, something that makes his matches worthwhile, again, so Mox caught a ride all the way down to Knoxville to chase that high he's been missing these last few months.

 

He's in the middle of lacing up his boots, hair hanging in his eyes, when his brain chooses to supply him with the fact that Knoxville is just about halfway between Cincinnati and Atlanta. Mox rejects the thought immediately, scowling at the floor. There are plenty of useless facts spinning around his brain to begin with, without horribly pathetic ones taking up residence as well.

 

It doesn't matter. Mox has been surprised, before, but there's no reason for him to know about this match. This may be the closest Mox had been to Georgia since they first met, but there's no reason for him to be here, at all.

 

Mox finds himself looking for Leakee, anyway. There's no sign of him in the crowd when Mox climbs into the ring, though his eyes can't seem to stop scanning the faces in search of a familiar one. His opponent for the night, some guy who might amount to something but will never be half of what Mox is, tries to take advantage while he's looking at the crowd when the bell rings, as if he's distracted or something. Even if he was off his game, the two of them are completely mismatched — their styles don't mesh well and Mox easily overpowers him, despite spending nearly as much time with his eyes on the audience as they are on his opponent.

 

It's an easy win. Mox isn’t exactly _upset_ about that, he fucking loves winning at most any cost, but something about the whole thing isn’t sitting right with him. It’s unsatisfying to come all this way for a lightning fast match. Leakee is still not in the crowd as he indulges in a quick celebration and leaves the ring, and why the fuck can’t he stop noticing something that’s not even missing? Mox gathers up his gear in the locker room, stuffs it all into his bag one piece at a time with angry, jerky movements, and starts walking out of the building.

 

Leakee is leaning against the wall, arms crossed, eyes at half mast as he watches the people leaving. Mox’s breath catches in his throat, and then Leakee sees him and his eyes widen momentarily and his mouth does that twitching thing that Mox likes, that fits his face so well. It knocks the wind out of him, a little, those punches landing in his gut, again. He grinds his teeth, free hand scratching at the side of his neck.

 

“What the fuck are you doin’ here?” he asks Leakee, despite it being obvious, by now. The look on Leakee’s face says as much, questioning why he’s even asking. “Get lost on the way to the pretty boy convention?”

 

“Cut your hair,” Leakee points out to him with a nod, as if Mox didn’t know, his face somewhere between detached amusement and slight aggravation. The usual, when it comes to him. There’s a weird clenching in Mox’s stomach, warm fingers on the back of his neck at the words. “And I never get lost, only sidetracked, sometimes. I miss anything?”

 

Mox wants answers, answers that he knows Leakee won’t give him outright. He wants to know why Leakee is here, why he keeps coming back when he must be able to get sex whenever he desires — wants to know how Leakee knew where to find him, how he always knows how to find him, why he took a gamble that Mox would still be here and hadn’t left far earlier in the night. Why it’s his immediate reaction to smile before he smothers it when he lays eyes on Mox. He never asks, though, because something else tells him that he doesn’t want to know (that he might be starting to understand).

 

“You missed fucking everything.” The anger that has been hanging around him since the end of his match flares up again in Mox. He feels like he’s had some sort of wish granted, and he’s furious at Leakee, at himself, because of it. “You’re an idiot, you’re a god damn idiot for coming, what did you think you were gonna see? What did you expect to get?” Certainly not Mox, he couldn’t possibly expect that he’d just blow in and sweep Mox away.

 

“You’re being awfully hostile, tonight. Having trouble finding that winning streak, again?” Leakee sounds smug, but he’s the one who told Mox, before, that he doesn’t like to see him lose. And it may not have been for anything other than his own selfish reasons, but the truth behind it still stands.

 

“Fuck you very much, you missed a crushing win. As usual, I looked incredible.” He keeps trying to smile, trying to laud himself over Leakee, but his stomach is still twisting in weird intervals and it’s hard to force his mouth into a grin, to unclench his teeth at the uncomfortable feeling. “And maybe I’m just sick of seeing your face around. I didn’t ask you to come.”

 

“No, you didn’t,” Leakee responds, shrugging one shoulder like it’s no skin off his back. Like he drove down the street to get here, and not a good four hours. “But every time I do, you always seem to enjoy it a little too much anyway. And how did you know I wasn’t here for your match? You keep an eye out for me all the time? I’m flattered.”

 

He certainly looks it, leaning against the wall and blinking lazily at Mox, slight smile never leaving his face. Mox cannot understand why his body was searching Leakee out, before, because right now his brain is screaming that the man is completely unpalatable. “I don’t have to deal with this shit, y’know. I can find much more entertaining things to do than stand around with someone who can’t keep up with my verbal sparring.” Even as he says it, he’s settling his shoulder up against the wall, mirroring Leakee’s stance and watching him closely. Mox kind of hates that he has no intention of actually walking away.

 

“I’m the only one who has ever been able to keep up with you,” Leakee boasts, and, despite the arrogance and the fact that he cannot, by definition, know that there is any truthfulness to that statement, he’s not wrong. He’s come closer than anyone else, at least. It’s — it means something. Mox isn’t sure what, but it means something to him. He wonders if Leakee doesn’t know that. He wonders how even Leakee’s bragging moments don’t sound like a lie. “Think you like that a little more than you let on. Plenty of other people you could be standing around talking to, at least.”

 

Mox blows upward at his hair, though it’s not hanging in his face, and shows all his teeth. “I can have anyone here I want, and you know it,” he says, ignoring the way Leakee’s words are stinging at him, like they’ve rubbed him raw. And he could, but no one else is half as interesting. Mox only just remembered the number he got, earlier in the night, the guy who slid a slip of paper into the back pocket of his jeans while fingers skimmed the top of his hip bone. That’s something he could have gone after, but this is just something he’d rather have. Somehow still seems like more of a challenge, even if he’s already won in the past. God, but Mox wonders how many people slide their numbers to Leakee with a shy smile, wonders how many of them he takes up on it. Wonders if any of them were ever so good that he called them by Mox’s name.

 

“Yeah, right,” Leakee agrees, and Mox grins at him, quickly, before he continues. “But you want me and you know it.” Mox’s face falls, a little, at that, but he doesn’t really have a comeback ready. Yeah, he wants Leakee, they’ve established that many times over, so there’s nothing much to dispute.

 

“If that’s what makes you feel better, coming all this way to see me and all,” he says, beginning to stroll outside and absolutely not smiling when Leakee follows. His arm itches a little, but Mox refuses to scratch it, settles instead for running his hand over the wall until there is no more wall and it meets the open air. The little balled up slip of paper finds its way into the trash right outside the door. “But you owe me. For being a little punkass and missing my match.”

 

“You are _not_ trying to claim emotional duress.” Leakee’s voice is thick with disbelief. It’s written all over his face, too, when Mox follows him to the same car, bag still flung over his shoulder. There’s a brief silence while he just stares at Mox, and Mox can practically hear the big lug trying to puzzle it out, raises an eyebrow in silent question. Leakee knows him, but that doesn’t mean Mox is going to hand out pieces for free. He lets the unspoken words drop for now, and they both climb into the unlocked car, Mox throwing the large bag at his feet and propping them up on it, knees bent toward his face.

 

“Fuck no. No duress here.” Mox wraps his arms around his legs, pulling them in tighter. It's still a little chilly outside, but the car is plenty warm without the heater running. “You just have an ever increasing list of debts, and this is the most recent example.”

 

Leakee glances at his phone, held in one hand, and Mox grits his teeth and speculates on what he’s looking at that could possibly be more interesting than him. It better be some damn good porn. “I don’t owe you shit,” he says, finally slipping the phone back into his pocket, “but I’ll give you something, anyway. Where’s your hotel?”

 

And Mox has roughly a million things he’d like to say to that. But what happens, instead, is that his brain sort of glitches, rewinds a bit to words he had just played off and starts thinking about them really hard. _You want me and you know it_. They’re a few minutes and a couple miles removed from the whole situation, and sitting in the car, now, just the two of them, it’s caught like a barb under his skin, sinking in deeper the more he tries to twist himself around and avoid it. Sure, he wants Leakee’s body, sometimes even appreciates his company, but when did that become automatically choosing him over any other possibility? The spicy scent hanging in the air, the one Mox normally only smells with his nose pressed firmly to Leakee’s skin, that he’s come to associate with his mouth doing any multitude of wicked things, this time it makes him pause. He needs alcohol desperately. “I was thinking more along the lines of a beer or four.”

 

Leakee gives him a strange look. The one like Mox is being weirder than normal. And he does, he does feel weird, but he thinks he’s been doing a good enough job of keeping those thoughts locked up tight, of not broadcasting them all over his face. “Okay, whatever,” Leakee shrugs, and thirty seconds later they’re pulling into some hick country hole in the wall that doesn’t really seem like his scene at all, but screams cheap whiskey and no air conditioning and that’s good enough for Mox, tonight.

 

They sit at a table rather than at the bar, across from each other, and that’s probably a mistake, now that Mox thinks about it, staring at Leakee on the other side of that slab of wood, dim lights casting him in a red-orange glow and eyes narrowed at Mox. He looks positively sinful in a way that anyone who is fully dressed, not lounging back on a rumpled up bed, has no right to look. His mouth starts to water, and Mox downs half his bottle in one go. He’s all twisted up, and he doesn’t know why.

 

Mox wants. He wants, but he doesn’t know what.

 

“They got shitty pizza here? I want some real greasy, nasty stuff.” Mox is trying to find other ways to occupy his mouth, because there are words there again, ones that he still doesn’t know. Tearing his eyes away from Leakee to glance at the bar causes a physical pain, but Mox does it anyway. Someday, there’s gonna come a time when Leakee doesn’t show up like a bad penny at the mere thought of him, and it’s better to get used to the idea now. When he spots the little sign on the counter, he shouts at the guy behind it, “Hey! Pepperoni pizza, por favor!”

 

“Sausage,” Leakee demands, having seen the three available choices too, apparently. God knows they can’t even agree on this. Mox still doesn’t look at him. “Pepperoni is disgusting, no wonder you like it.”

 

“Disgusting, maybe, yet I am not the one showing a disgusting disrespect for the rules of common decency and missing my match, tonight, so pepperoni wins, jackass.” Mox grins at him, playing with the neck of his bottle, trying to spin the thing as fast as he can without spilling. Leakee is already looking at him, a grin forming on his face, and Mox wonders if that’s a good or bad sign. “And who said I’m sharing?”

 

“It’s cute,” Leakee says at the same time, talking over the tail end of Mox’s words. Bad, then, a definite bad sign. “You being all upset that I didn’t make it in time.” Mox grimaces at him, but before he gets in a word, edgewise, Leakee is smirking and waving a hand at him. “Go ahead, then. You love to talk. Tell me all about it, every little detail.”

 

And Mox refuses to, if he’s gonna be so damn smug. “I don’t care if you were there or not. Either way, beat the guy in three minutes fifteen. Isn’t much to tell.” His hands get clumsy, knocking the bottle over, and he lets out an undignified whine when a small amount leaks out onto the table before he can right it. Leakee watches the whole thing, shaking his head slowly, but Mox is not about to be embarrassed in front of him.

 

“Then there wasn’t much to miss, now, was there.” And yes, there was, there was a reminder that Mox is a dominant force, and that Leakee would do well to remember that, right now, but that’s not the point. The point is that it’s rude, it’s fucking rude of him to show up after missing the most important part of the night and act like Mox is nothing, like he missed nothing. Mox shifts in his seat, throws his bottle cap and hits Leakee square in the chest with it. Leakee’s head drops, watching the thing fall into his lap, and despite the bitter taste in his mouth, Mox feels the corner of it pulling up.

 

“Think you missed me,” he smirks, batting his lashes, and Leakee rolls his eyes, a little, but he isn’t looking away. “But, eh, wasn’t much of a match.” He’s not going to say that Leakee was right, because he wasn’t — the match may have been shit, but he missed eyefuls of Mox looking amazing, and that’s something he should be mourning.

 

“Disappointing?” Leakee asks, almost like he might care, and Mox laughs.

 

“After going through the trouble to come all this way for it? Yeah, to say the least.” Leakee nods at him, maybe understands, in a weird and different sort of way, but at least he’s not looking sorry for Mox. Not that he expected it. That’s not the sort of thing that Leakee would feel, anyway.

 

“Anyway. Draft’s just around the corner,” Mox mumbles into his beer, right before he takes another swig. That’s a big deal to Leakee, he knows, and gets the focus off of him for awhile. “Guy I banged last week couldn’t shut up about it.” He only meant to start up a topic that Leakee might find more comfortable, to see if he could get that nice smile to return, but the other man glowers at him from across the table, and his jaw moves in an odd way, like he’s chewing on the side of his mouth, and he won’t look at Mox, now.

 

It’s then that Mox realizes what he just said, tacked on at the end as an afterthought, and watching Leakee trying to make eye contact with the bottle in front of him, its effect on him makes something electric prickle down his neck and both his arms in excitement, is fascinating. “That look, oh, that’s a real nasty look, real upset. You wouldn’t be jealous, now, would you?” There’s a part of him that almost wants to tell Leakee not to be, that no one else’s ass could hold a candle to his, but this is more fun. He’s trying to hold laughter back, and it’s just not working, a chuckle slipping through his lips, and Leakee’s face goes even more stony.

 

“Not at all,” Leakee says, finally glancing to Mox, again, “Just don’t wanna hear about you being nasty while I’m about to eat,” and Mox feels his entire face light up, because that’s one of the tamer sentences to ever come out of Mox’s mouth, and Leakee’s response is a lie. It’s a lie and Leakee wants to be the only one who gets to fuck Mox, because maybe they can’t do this part quite right, the talking and the being around each other in general, but that, that they have made an art form. They’re magic when they’re touching each other — Mox feels euphoric with Leakee’s hands on him, like his head was screwed off and not tightened back up again, and for those minutes and hours he can ignore all the other shit going on in his life. Maybe Leakee feels the same when Mox has his lips on him, like he’s seeing heaven with his cock in the tight wet suction of Mox’s mouth. Maybe he wonders if Mox doesn’t give that same feeling to everyone he’s with. But Mox doesn’t feel quite the same with anyone but him. It’s probably just them. They just click. At least, like that.

 

The pizza is ready up at the bar, and Leakee is rising to pick it up, but Mox doesn’t want to lose the sight of him desperately trying to appear unaffected and uncaring. He nearly reaches out to grab Leakee’s arm, but wraps his fist around his empty bottle, instead. Leakee brings two more bottles back with the food, bottlecaps already removed, this time, sliding one toward Mox, who catches it and pushes the other one away. Mox grabs a slice, once he sets the pizza down, pulls a piece of pepperoni off and flings it at Leakee’s chest. He looks at Mox, then, long and unblinking, while Mox grins roguishly and stuffs the food in his mouth. “Don’ pout, s’ not hot, even wi’those lips. M’dick’s all yours, tonight.”

 

Leakee snorts out an unamused laugh, taking a slice of his own and peeling each piece of topping off, dropping them all on the half facing Mox. He licks his thumb, after, and his index finger next, two quick swipes of his tongue, and Mox has to take a drink his mouth goes so dry. Mox picks up all the rounds, shoving them in his mouth and swallowing them down.

 

“Not sure I want it. God knows where it’s been.” Mox is about to comment that the same applies to him, but Leakee continues before he can. “But, yeah, draft’s a month away.” His face twists into the tiniest of smiles when he says it, eyes down, not like they’re avoiding Mox’s but like they’re focused on something far away, and Mox’s mouth feels stuffed full of cotton all over again, but for a completely different reason. He’s not even sure what his excuse is.

 

“You got a team all lined up, then?” he asks, voice rough. Something about that simple smile feels private, like something special that he’s sharing with Mox. Mox takes a long gulp of beer, draining most of the rest of it. There’s a part of his brain that whispers _Cincinnati_ , _Cincinnati_ , over and over again, but that’s stupid and despite the meetings he probably wants to be somewhere that has more than a hail mary shot at a winning season. They’re a shit team anyway and if Leakee is any good at all, he’s probably better than they could dream of snagging, even with a high choice.

 

Leakee peels another piece of pepperoni off the pizza and flings it at Mox, this time, though it sails just past his left shoulder and falls to the floor behind him. He chuckles and Leakee echoes it, eyes squinting with laugh lines surrounding them. “Nah, just talks with a few. Nothing concrete. But I’m good. I’ll be good.”

 

“Good,” Mox repeats, the word burning like fire on his tongue. He doesn’t think there’s enough beer in this place to drown the way he’s feeling. He steals Leakee’s, then, takes a drink from it before sliding it back, and Leakee doesn’t say a word but makes a show of wiping off the rim with the sleeve of his jacket, and Mox snorts. “Never seen you play, but, I mean, you look like you could take some fuckers out. Could kick some ass if you needed to. Bet you come in handy in a fight.”

 

“Never really had need to find out,” Leakee shrugs, stripping another slice of pizza of all its fatty goodness. Mox is appalled by his eating habits — life is too short to be wasting perfectly good food. “You really get in a lot of those, outside the ring?”

 

“Enough.” Mox immediately stuffs half of another piece in his mouth, to give himself an excuse not to expand on that. Normally he’d have no problem regaling people with play by play recounts of the latest time some misguided idiot decided to take a swing at him despite Mox having a good few inches on them, or show off his most recent shiner, but the way Leakee says the words, it seems like that’s what he’s expecting to hear. Got to keep him on his toes, a little.

 

Mox is kicking his feet back and forth under the table, trying to do something with the restless energy he’s collected while sitting still, and one of them connects with one of Leakee’s before he starts swinging them in slightly smaller arcs. Leakee immediately kicks out right back at him, concentrated on his latest piece of pizza, like he didn’t even realize he did it. Mox starts hitting him repeatedly, then, grinning when Leakee looks up at him, and the other man gives him one swift kick to the shin without even glancing under the table. Mox lets out a howl and starts cursing him, and Leakee is nothing but cool and calm. “You don’t wanna start one here, believe me. You’re always biting off more than you can chew.”

 

At that, Mox shoves the entire rest of the last slice in his mouth, staring Leakee down the whole time. He can chew just fine, could still chew Leakee up and spit him out whenever he so chooses. It’s just. It’s not the right time. This is more fun, even like this.

 

“Whatever. I’m not even bothered by your boorishness anymore.” Leakee drains his beer, and there’s nothing but some leftover pepperoni remaining from the pizza. Mox finishes those off, licking his fingers to see if he gets a similar reaction to what Leakee got out of him before. He’s not disappointed. “You have a room to go back to?”

 

“Cutting right to the chase, aren’t you? But, nope. Got dropped off right at the gym.” Which reminds him, he’s still not sure how he’s gonna get back home. There’s always hitchhiking, sure, but he wonders if Leakee would give him a lift for a blow job in return. The drive is maybe eight hours out of his way, but Mox is sure he could make it worth his time.

 

“No point in fucking around,” Leakee says, throwing a couple bills down on the table before getting up. Mox follows him out the door, tab apparently settled while he wasn’t paying attention, because Leakee doesn’t ask him what he thinks he’s doing bailing on his half. Which is how it should fucking be, really, because Mox still remembers spending a small fortune on food for him, before.

 

He catches up to Leakee, reaches a hand forward to grab his ass, and when Leakee shoots him a dirty look, Mox smiles serenely. “But I just love fuckin’ around, babe.”

 

They’re both in the car again, just sitting there for a moment, and Mox stares at Leakee in the silence until he breaks it. “So, what do you want to do?”

 

And Mox, oh, he has ideas. “We could, like. We could go get more beer and shoot off fireworks in a parking lot or out the car window or something. We could see how fast you can drive down the highway with me jerking you off. If you’re feeling more chill, we could see if we can score some weed. The night is young.”

 

Leakee is easing the car back onto the road; he drives like an old grandmother, slow and uncomfortably close to the person in front of him. “I always feel more intelligent after hearing your thoughts and suggestions.” Mox growls in response, pulls his knees in and plants his feet on the dash in front of him, hoping it will piss Leakee off. “How about we just go get a room.”

 

Mox doesn’t respond to that except to shrug, because he doesn’t trust anything he might say. Leakee seems to be in a hurry to get to the fucking around, after all, but Mox is, against all odds, having fun with this. Apparently, he’s the only one. Whatever. Doesn’t matter. They do sex better than civil conversation and shooting the shit anyway, he supposes. Leakee has the right idea, again, and Mox is being stupid. He opens the window halfway and closes it, just for the motorized sound, then thinks better of it and rolls it down again, pulling out a cigarette and lighting it. “Do you mind?” Leakee asks, exasperated as always, and Mox just lets his head loll to the side and blinks back.

 

“Not at all.”

 

When they finally pull into a hotel, it’s a much fancier one than Mox would normally stay at, because Leakee is a spoiled princess trying to rebel with Mox to spite his family or some shit, but he can’t bring himself to slum it. It’s out of his price range, but not ridiculously so, and Mox is the one who goes inside and scrapes together the cash and pays for the room anyway, just so it’s his, so he can have the pleasure of kicking Leakee out of it, later. It cuts his gas money bribe a little short, but. He’s always been able to make ends meet.

 

By the time they stumble into the room, connected at their mouths, Mox is already throwing Leakee’s jacket on the floor, his belt buckle undone — he may love fucking around, but he hates to waste time. Leakee certainly wanted to get this over with, he thinks, lips pulled back in a snarl. He’s rough, pushing and pulling and yanking Leakee’s head around by his hair, using his teeth liberally and giving him less time to get adjusted to his fingers before he pushes in than he probably should, but Leakee isn’t complaining and he’s giving it back just as hard, hands bruising where they dig into his arms and wrap around his thighs. Leakee flips them over mid-thrust, so he’s straddling Mox and sinking down further on his cock, and he pins Mox’s wrists to the bed while he rides him. Mox wants to bite his lip and he wants to punch his face and he wants to wring him dry and he wants to suck his cock right here, in this position, but it’s not physically possible, it’s just not going to happen, so he snaps his hips to meet Leakee’s until his eyes are rolling back in his head and when his arms are released he beats a fist against Leakee’s chest, hard, until hands capture both of his again.

 

Mox pulls one hand out of the grip, and he wants to punch and yell and shout but he’s out of breath and he doesn’t have the words, doesn’t know if they exist for what he’s trying to say — what he ends up doing, instead, is touching his knuckles to Leakee’s cheek, tapping it hard and leaving them there, just as he comes.

 

Leakee melts into the bed, after, the two of them a mess, and Mox blinks at him again. _You want me and you know it_. Yeah, he did, and now he’s had him, and they’re done. Leakee’s done.

 

“You mind telling me why you were trying to knock me out?” Leakee asks him, when he starts to move again, and, yeah, Mox is really not inclined to at all. He’s upset, and he’s mad that he’s upset, that he’s offended when there’s no reason to be — this is what they’re good at, this is what they do, this is what they are. Nothing’s changed.

 

If they can be this rough with each other — there is a dark mark in the shape of a mouth on Leakee’s upper arm, angry red teeth marks visible on the outline, purple blotches forming on his chest, little round bruises dotted into Mox’s thighs that he’s sure would match up with fingertips and a neck ache from when he was slammed into the mattress — and not care, then it doesn’t matter, and nothing’s changed. This is all they are, harsh words and messed up sheets and pains in each other’s asses.

 

“You might as well stay,” he says instead, wiping himself down with a towel he pulled out of his bag before slipping back into his underwear. Leakee is watching him very carefully, like it’s a trick and he’s afraid Mox is threatening to snap or something. But he’s not. He doesn’t care. “Two rooms are stupid, anyway. You can spot me some cash for this one.” _Unless you’re really just dying to escape my company_ , he thinks bitterly, and if so, good fucking riddance.

 

He can feel the questioning in the gaze without even glancing back at Leakee — there’s only one bed in the room, and two of them, and that’s very close to be — but it doesn’t matter. It’s a fucking king sized bed and they won’t even know the other is in it and it doesn’t matter.

 

“You’re so generous,” Leakee says, and he’s trying to sound sarcastic but mostly it comes out like a question. He might still be trying to feel Mox out, but there’s nothing to feel out because it’s okay and he’s fine and this whole thing is dumb. Mox scratches at his forearm, trying to settle into the sheets.

 

“That’s what everyone says about me,” he tells Leakee, and when he smiles it feels genuine because it’s _fine_ , and Leakee smirks back like he’s finally realized that everything is normal and there is nothing weird going on with Mox at all. Mox runs a hand through his own hair and messes it up, even more, and Leakee’s eyes don’t go soft while he’s looking at him because there’s no reason for them to, and Mox flops down into a laying position and buries himself under covers.

 

“Yeah, I’ve heard,” Leakee answers, sardonic lilt to it, before the bed shifts and he’s lying back down, too. They’re both under the sheets, and there’s a heat radiating at Mox’s back that he’s not used to feeling. He’s tense, lying stiffly, but the added warmth is relaxing, lulls him to sleep, for once his legs not curled up into his body to keep his temperature up.

  
When he wakes up the next morning, the weight of Leakee’s arm is draped over him from behind, and Mox absolutely does not take a second to lay there with his eyes closed and consider the feeling before he drives an elbow back and tries to hit his solar plexus.


	7. not what i planned at all

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY SHIT. I try not to get too ridiculous about my own stories, but I'm actually crying a little typing this out. This has been eight and a half months of pure struggle, a huge labor of love, scrapping things and redoing entire sections and thinking about completely changing the remainder of my outline altogether, and I really feel like I've climbed a mountain, here. I know this story isn't the best thing I've written, technically speaking: it's not the most lyrical or metaphorical, it's choppy and doesn't have the greatest transitions, but goddamn it, it's my favorite. I promised it would get finished, and it's getting finished.
> 
> Hope there are still people out there interested in this fic.

Mox wondered if it said something that the first thing he thought to do wasn’t to laugh but apologize.

 

He did neither, but after Leakee stumbled off into the bathroom, fresh, creative curses still spilling out from under his breath, arm pressed into and holding the ribs that might have been starting to bruise by then, Mox was left to his own devices for the next goddamn hour while he went through whatever process it is that keeps him looking the way he does, prissy hair products and bathing in the fuckin’ blood of his enemies and whatever. And Mox sat on the edge of the bed, head down, hair tangled in his hands. Once the sound of the shower was blasting from the other room, he occupied himself with strewing the meager contents of his gear bag around and rearranging them, leaving out his fresh shirt, digging through the bag that didn’t belong to him — fair game, as Leakee had left it unzipped in the room — and scrutinizing what he found in there. Mox had overlooked packing clean underwear, had planned to just go commando or wear the old ones he had on, but upon seeing Leakee had an extra pair, well, they’d shared a lot more than that. The red ones — Leakee’s skin would look amazing, them hugging the strip of it around his hips — were added to the pile, along with his jeans and hoodie from the day before, salvaged from the floor.

 

Mox didn’t really know what to do with himself, after that. He pulled those clothes on, went for a smoke, flipped five times through fifty channels of the same three fucking infomercials before settling on some Saturday morning cartoon, banged on the bathroom door yelling nonsense words for a solid minute until Leakee’s voice drifted back out toward him through the sound of water pelting down, disgusted with the interruption.

 

By the time Leakee dragged his ass out of the bathroom, cloud of steam billowing out behind him, Mox was absentmindedly folding paper from the pad he found on the desk, releasing the crooked and misshapen airplanes to fly across the room. That one, he’d timed perfectly, the nose of it poking sharply into Leakee’s chest, and they both watched it spiral and crash to the ground. “That's for using all the hot water and not invitin’ me, princess.” He tossed another one, letting it fly harder than the first, the thing smashing into the wall beside Leakee. “But that one, that’s a special one.”

 

Leakee took his sweet time retrieving the plane and, once he’d gathered it up, tore the shoddy craftsmanship to shreds, the pieces littering the floor.

 

“Rude,” Mox scowled, the rough treatment making a misplaced sense of pride in his creations swell up.

 

“Rude? Rude is broken ribs and not allowing a man peace during his alone time.”

 

The discomfort that had been flitting around in his chest since he woke up — since the night before — pulled hot and tight at his throat. Mox ignored it in favor of an easy smirk, his fingers fiddling with the last sheet of paper on the pad. “Fail to see just why you’d be lookin’ for all that alone time when I’m right here and willing.” Mox pressed down hard into the fold, creasing it with all the force he wanted to use to dig nails into his own forearm. His lips pulled back further, some sort of forced grin that must have been nearly as telling as the words, though Leakee didn’t point it out. “But. Despite all that, I’m feelin’ generous, right now. Got an offer for you.”

 

Leakee eyed him warily. He was still unconsciously protecting the side that Mox had elbowed upon first waking, so maybe it was somewhat warranted, but that didn’t mean Leakee didn’t deserve it. “I’m sure I don’t want any part of it.” His foot crushed another of Mox’s planes as he took a couple steps over and dug through his bag, grabbing his clothes, and Mox dipped his fingers under the waistband of his jeans to play with the elastic of the briefs he stole, smiling at his secret.

 

“You never wanna hear me out,” he complained, reaching over to pull out a shirt that Leakee immediately stuffed straight back in, not even looking at him. Mox repeated the action, removed a pair of jeans that Leakee clearly wasn’t reaching for, and those quickly found their way back into place, too. “How long were you plannin’ on being gone? You got, like, three pairs of pants. Jesus Christ.”

 

The question went ignored as Leakee pulled out other clothing, tossing each piece to the side. It was a throwaway comment, so maybe that was why it remained unanswered, but whatever the explanation could have been was suddenly very interesting to Mox. When he grabbed a third item, a rolled up pair of socks, tossing them back and forth between his hands, Leakee finally glanced away from whatever he was searching for, a soft huff escaping his lungs. It sounded exasperated, but there was that slight tilt to his lips. “What?”

 

“Don't even wanna tell you, now.” His own mouth had curved into a grin as he spun the socks in his hand, attempting not to dwell on the fact that this wasn’t the first time he’d watched Leakee pulling on clothes. It was fucking weird, though, that shirt sliding over his head, fabric clinging to his body in a way Mox could only wish to get close enough to. Strange to watch him get ready for a day that Mox would be a part of, if he had any say in the matter.

 

He tossed his ball back into the open bag. “But, how's about this. You take me home, so I don't have to chance my luck on the open road, and, in restitution, I will ever-so-kindly suck your dick.”

 

Leakee barely even peeked up from where he was fastening his belt. “You’re not serious.” The way he said it wasn’t even incredulous. Almost sounded like a fact, like he’d already convinced himself of the truth of his statement. Like it was a completely unreasonable thing to suggest, when Leakee usually drove the entire distance, anyway, and for less of a purpose than this would have.

 

“S’not like I couldn’t find another ride if I needed to,” Mox sniffed, coughed a couple times to clear the gravel from his throat. The absence of the socks created the need for something to do with his hands, but he didn't know what else to settle for other than running them up and down the thighs of his crossed legs. Leakee was casting furtive glances at him as he stowed the rest of his bathroom supplies, which was always a step in the right direction. “But, let’s be serious here. Is that really an offer you’re willin’ to turn down?”

 

Leakee did look at him, then, eyes narrowed and searching and mouth opened just the tiniest sliver. Mox had the strangest itch to grab his chin and close it for him, plant a kiss or two on those full lips. “Fine,” he finally said, zipping up his bag to give the whole thing this air of finality that made Mox laugh. “Only because it's Saturday, and I don't have to be back until tomorrow night.”

 

“ _Only because_ ,” he drawled in a mocking tone, though his own implication made him shiver, something crawling under his skin. Which is how they found themselves here, speeding up Interstate 75 toward Ohio, Mox hanging yet another cigarette out the window of the car.

 

Leakee’s has his eyes fixed firmly ahead, out the windshield, not speaking a word about the first one, but when he lights his second, that’s apparently just too fucking much. “Do you have to do that?” he asks, glancing over with what really doesn’t amount to enough disgust for him to be calling Mox out on the situation.

 

“If I only did things I had to…”

 

“Maybe you wouldn’t constantly have people trying to beat the hell out of you,” Leakee suggests. Mox turns his scowl on the car they’re passing, arm draped across the barrier of the door and into the cool April breeze. Thirty minutes into a four hour drive, and already Leakee can’t leave him alone.

 

“S’not like you care, I’m all busted up n’shit, right?” Leakee hums in what Mox can only assume is agreement, the low timbre of it shifting nicely in his stomach, before it pulls something tight in his chest. It makes him cough, aside from the smoke he’s currently blowing out of his lungs, his body beginning to ache from the force of the contraction of muscle. By the time he recovers enough to chance a glance over at Leakee, the other man is sneaking a peek over with a frown, eyebrows furrowed in what can't be concern, so Mox squashes that thought before it gets away from him.

 

Leakee drops the facade as soon as he realizes he's being watched, anyway. “Seriously. You reek like an ashtray.”

 

Mox laughs, something rattling in his throat that he’ll probably need to cough up later. For now, though, he shoves the urge down, his own ribs still giving off a dull throb of pain. “That, I can fuckin’ wash off. You, tragically, will always smell like an asshole.” Mox folds his legs up and props his feet up on the dashboard, knees pressed up and into his neck enough to rest his chin on, twisting his mouth into a mockery of a grimace. “The painful fuckin’ truth.”

 

“Nah, that's you, too.” Leakee watches him twist around to blow another lungful of smoke out the window, the first stirrings of a smile crossing his face in what seems like awhile. Mox looks away from the nearly fond expression, busies himself instead with tossing the butt of his last cigarette out the window. There aren’t anymore to occupy himself with, because apparently moderation is not a concept he can ever wrap his fucking head around, so the empty pack gets thrown away too. Leakee watches every move, from what Mox can see out of the corner of his eye.

 

“Watch the fuckin’ road.” Leakee closes his window from the other side of the car in response, and Mox lets his head lazily roll from one side to the other, taking in his primary view for the next three — or so — hours. Not bad, by all accounts, especially when Leakee ducks his head with a chuckle and actually listens for once, staring straight ahead.

 

The silence that settles for awhile is comfortable, for him at least, thick as a warm blanket, so Mox lets his eyes slide closed, turns on his side as best he can, and presses one cheek into the sun-warmed fabric of the seat.

 

—

 

It doesn’t last.

 

When Mox snaps out of the sleepy daze he’s fallen into, another hour has passed and they’re halfway there. Leakee, apparently bored by the seemingly endless miles, hounds him with questions he’s never asked before, and Mox wonders just why he wants the answers. 

 

(“How the fuck do you keep yourself entertained when m’not around to do it for you?” he asks at one point, mystified by the behavior. His legs are stretched out under the dash, now, after beating some feeling back into them with closed fists, and he reaches over to fiddle with the buttons on the center console, the radio springing to life with a sudden burst of sound before he turns it down to a manageable level.

 

“I manage,” Leakee deadpans, straight-faced and changing the station, and when Mox scoffs in disbelief, he cracks a smile. “Can’t expect the best of company all the time.” Mox grins to himself even as something in his chest twists.)

 

“No, I’m not telling you that. That’s gross.”

 

“I love gross. Disgust me.”

 

Leakee turns to give him a look. The narrowed, squinty eyes are hidden behind those sunglasses, but Mox can imagine it, anyway. “Like that’s even possible.” Mox will give him that small victory, maybe — can’t think of a time when something has truly been too much for him to accept, apart from the way Leakee looks at him, sometimes, and while that’s similar to repulsion, the way it makes his stomach turn, it’s not really quite the same. “Maybe. If you tell me something.”

 

Mox leers over at him, flicks a tongue over his slightly chapped lips, the words  _ show me yours first _ dying in his mouth. “I’m an open book, baby,” he says instead, appreciating the slight flinch in Leakee at the chosen name before he recovers.

 

“What’s the most fucked up thing you ever did?”

 

Debatable, Mox thinks, huffing out a surprised noise. There are a lot of stories to choose from. Nothing he wouldn’t do all over again, though. “I shoved a caramel apple down a kid’s throat, once,” is what ends up coming out of his mouth, though he’s done far worse with much more damaging weapons. He's not even sure what type of reaction he's looking for, just that he wants _something_.

 

Next to him, Leakee laughs a little, looking as startled by it as Mox is. He's pretty sure that's not a typical response to something like that, but the two of them, they're not really typical people, are they. “You did not.”

 

“Did so,” Mox shoots back, petulant as always, grin pulling tight across his face. He may be a liar, but he hates being called one, especially when, this time, he's telling — an admittedly stretched version of — the truth. “I did, stick and all, and if you don't shut your fuckin’ mouth, I'll do the same to you.”

 

Leakee chuckles. “Good luck finding one. It’s not really that time of year.” Mox has to laugh along with him, at that, and he’s not thinking about whether or not Leakee would like the sweet taste, if he did manage to track one down.

 

“Think I can come up with more satisfying things for you to choke on,” Mox grins wolfishly, expecting some sort of sputtering or flushing on Leakee’s end, but what the other man ends up doing is turning to face him, head dipping down so that the glasses fall far enough that Mox can see his eyes, the edge of his lips curling into a smug sort of look that has Mox’s fingers itching as they curl into his palms.

 

“Thought you were the one who liked being choked.” Mox’s entire mouth goes dry at that, the temperature in the car rising by what must be a few degrees as he attempts not to let his eyes bulge out of his head, a little. Because, on one hand, true — he can’t really deny it, and wouldn’t, honestly. But on the other, fuck Leakee for just bringing it up so casually, thinking he’s Mox or something like that. Thinking it’s something they’re just going to talk about, or some shit. Leakee turns back to the road in front of him, watching as the distance between them and Mox’s home shrinks a little more with each second that ticks by, and he looks so unbearably self-satisfied at Mox’s answering silence, relaxed and at ease, that Mox can’t turn away.

 

Mox wants to kiss him. He doesn’t know why he wants to, but he wants to.

 

The road turns up ahead, announcing the two miles left until the next rest stop, and Mox shifts in his chair uncomfortably, thinks about asking to get out, for a bit. The car is starting to feel a bit cramped, something about the shared space or the shared air or the way Leakee’s hand occasionally drifts toward the console separating them and hangs there, halfway between his own body and Mox, like it’s reaching for something. A little further and he could wrap those fingers around Mox’s thigh and squeeze and —

 

A throat clears before he glances up — Leakee smiles at him from behind the sunglasses, the crinkling of his eyes at the corners only just visible, right as they hit a pothole in the road, and Mox’s stomach swims. 

 

“Pull off here,” Mox demands, arm flailing at the blue sign, nearly radioactive neon in the bright sunlight.

 

“We’re gonna be in Cincinnati in, like, thirty minutes.”

 

“Yeah, well, this is probably the last stop and I have to take a piss.”

 

Leakee takes the exit, but apparently feels the need to be completely insufferable resurfacing, as he parks literally the furthest from the building he possibly can, under the shade of several large trees. He doesn't move to get out of the car, though, so Mox takes off like a shot, mumbling the whole way about selfish assholes.

 

It's a clean place, not too rundown and shoddy, and unbelievably empty for the time of day. Mox takes his precious time, bracing his hands against the edges of the sink and just breathing, for a little bit. The long drive has his stomach turning, twisted up in knots, though Mox has never been particularly prone to getting carsick. The road is bumpy, though, he figures, even if the ride is going faster than he imagined, and it’s bound to make anyone a bit nauseous. Almost fucking done, now, though, and he won’t have to worry about traveling miles upon miles at a time, at least for a little while. Certainly not with Leakee, he thinks bitterly. Better to make the worst of it now, just so he never feels the way he did last night again.

 

When he returns from the bathroom, Mox opens the back door and slides in, attempts to make his voice as grating as possible.“This is nice,” Mox looks around the interior of the vehicle as if he really cares, pressing down into the seats that are the exact same as the one he’s been planted in the last few hours, before spreading himself out, one leg taking up the whole bench. “Spacious back seat and shit. Perfect for the practical consumer.”

 

Leakee turns around in the driver’s seat, head peeking between the two headrests to give Mox a look. His lips twitch upward, again, and Mox is feeling sick to his stomach, again. “Get back in the front.”

 

“You wanna be closer? I’m flattered.” He makes no movement, though, other than to lie back further, arms behind his head as he rests it against the window behind him. Leakee watches every tick of his leg as it bounces, though, and Mox closes his eyes just to listen and soak in the warmth of the sun beating in through the window. It’s nearly a minute later, probably, when he hears a sigh and a body shifting, the click of a seatbelt and the metallic squeal of a car door opening, followed by another.

 

Leakee eases a knee between the leg Mox has on the floor and the one on the seat. Mox allows his eyes to flutter open and watch Leakee crawl forward on the seat, pushing himself up into more of a sitting position to make room for him. “You’re being ridiculous,” Leakee tells him, reaching back to close the door behind him, trapping them even closer together than they had been before. The car has its own smell, far from that sharp, new scent, but clean — all he can smell now is Leakee, spice and sweat and the hint of something drifting from his hair, something sickly sweet, and Mox feels a little dizzy, a little high. “We’re nearly there.”

 

He grins up at Leakee, the shades gone and his skin practically glowing in the daylight, in a way Mox has rarely seen him before. “Gotta take a break sometime, sunshine.” It wouldn’t be much of a stretch to kiss him, right here, but the fact that he even had that thought has Mox shying away from it, leaning back a bit further. “Now’s as good a time as any.”

 

Leakee rolls his eyes, Mox laughing at him, until they seem to stop on something. “You’re wearing my underwear.” Mox lets his own line of sight travel down until he catches the band underneath his rucked up shirt, the hint of red right beneath it, and Mox shimmies his hips, a bit, trying to bring them up to meet Leakee’s hand where it’s lingering, again, always halfway in between them.

 

“Look pretty damn good on me, don’t they?” Goddamn it, he’s nearly panting already, quickly getting hard at the way Leakee is looking at him wearing his clothes, eyes wide but rapidly getting darker, hungrier.

 

Leakee’s thumbs are sliding over his hipbones, dipping under the waistband that even the elastic isn’t quite tight enough to keep firmly against his body. “I was looking for these this morning, you asshole.” He doesn’t exactly sound upset, though, and Mox grins down as those trailing fingers unbutton his pants for him, sliding across his abdomen as they push the fly open. 

 

“Yeah, well, I’m putting ‘em to better use, anyway.” Leakee hums low in his throat, almost a growl, his eyes not once straying from the skin he’s exposed between Mox’s ridden up shirt and the wide gape of his open jeans.

 

“You owe me more than a blow job.”

 

“That’s the price we agreed upon, sunshine.” When Leakee pulls the briefs down, though, Mox’s half-hard cock freed from the confines, and swallows him down like he’s been salivating over the idea the entire time, he slides a hand to the back of his head, lets several expletives fly, and contemplates renegotiating terms. At least he’s completely sure of what to expect, now, anyway.

 

—

 

Mox finishes what he thinks might be his fifth beer, crushing the can in his fist and heaving the remaining misshapen metal down the hall with a howl that makes his vocal cords ache. The stash of alcohol he'd brought with him has dwindled to nothing, and he needs more, but he also needs not to move from this spot, his padded knees tucked up into his bare chest, legs shivering with pins and needles from sitting awkwardly on the cold linoleum.

 

No one is coming within a two hundred foot radius of him, which is impressive considering the size of the building. It doesn't help, as that means there's no one to bring him another fucking drink, but he'd be just as likely to punch whatever guy tried as he would to take any offering and ignore him. Probably moreso.

 

He doesn't know how long he's been here. Ever since he left the office, for sure, flailing to hit anyone who dared to step into his way. He shoves the palms of his hands into his eyes, rubbing at them harshly with a yell of frustration that slowly increases in volume until all he can hear is the sound of his “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH” echoing down the corridor.

 

So he's less than prepared when a hand reaches down to pat at his shoulder, hand swinging wildly to strike the intruder in the shin with a rough blow. The grunt that echoes at the hard smack is familiar, though, and his mind stumbles through a messy patch of jumbled memories before deciding it can't place the sound anywhere in the ring, from any match he can recall. Mox lets his eyes slide up the length of the tall, tall body in front of him until they fall on the face so high above. Leakee’s face.

 

It's pulled into a tight grimace, his body curling as if he wants to rub at his injured leg. He looks a little harried, as if he was in a rush to get to wherever he was heading, chest heaving in and out with rushed breaths, the warmth of his skin and the color in his cheeks a welcome contrast to the cool interior of the building as he looks down.

 

He's the best thing Mox has ever seen.

 

“You found me,” he marvels, blinking up, a little questioning, a little in awe, wondering if he’s seeing things, though he’s never hallucinated from a few too many before. “You found me.”

 

The floor underneath him doesn’t seem quite so uncomfortable now, as Mox shifts against the unforgiving hardness against his ass. Would like another one there, more, and the thought makes him laugh. Real, non-hallucination Leakee gives him a humorless grin and leans against the wall opposite him. “Yeah, well, you’re making an awful lot of noise.”

 

“You like my noises,” Mox shoots back, but that’s not what he meant. Leakee keeps showing up when he least expects it — and Mox tries  _ not  _ to expect it, his showing up at all — but here they both are, same time, same place, out of the entire rest of the world, again, and that — that has to mean something, doesn’t it? He’s not sure whether it’s good or bad, but it’s significant, somehow.

 

Leakee doesn't confirm or deny, just purses his lips for a second and takes in the sight of Mox on the floor. “You have a match in, like, fifteen minutes.”

 

Mox waves a flippant hand at him. Leakee should come closer, he thinks, rather than stare at him from so far away. “Not concerned about that. I’ll win. You wanna know why?” There's an echo of a voice in his head telling him to lean closer and whisper, so he does. “I’ll tell you. S’a secret, never told anyone.”

 

That causes the ghost of a smile to cross over Leakee’s face while he leans down and picks up the empty cans and bottle that Mox hasn’t discarded already, only to throw them in a nearby trash can that he never noticed. Mox nearly reaches out to grab his wrist when he starts to move away again. “Sure. Why’s that?”

 

“I’m the best.” Leakee gives a low chuckle that feels like it echoes all through Mox’s body.

 

“That’s it? Pretty sure you’ve told everyone that since the day you were born.”

 

“No. No, no, no, this is different, okay, this is none of that cocky bullshit.” His hands are moving too much, he knows it, but they don’t want to listen to his brain anymore, it seems. Nothing does, really, despite the fact that it knows, above and beyond, what’s going on better than the rest of him. “I’m the best. I just. I am. Can beat anyone here, and I know it. They know it too, they all _know it_ ,” he shouts, wanting them to hear, to understand that he’s onto them. “S’why they’re shuttin’ me out.”

 

There’s a long pause for Leakee to absorb this information, to agree wholeheartedly with the point Mox is making, but when he speaks again, they’re not the words Mox is expecting. “You can’t hold the title all the time, you egotistical jerk.”

 

Mox’s eyes narrow even as he tries to laugh. It doesn’t sound quite right. “Not what I mean, s’not what I meant.” That laughter is ripped from his throat again — feels like he chokes on it. “HWA is closing shop! To me, at least.  _ Everyone  _ should be celebrating. They’re finally gettin’ rid of me!” Saying the words out loud, in his own voice, suddenly makes them a thousand times more real than they had seemed standing in the tiny, stuffy broom closet of an office. Mox had laughed then, too, because it was funny, right? Not like a joke, but like the feeling he's always gotten from tearing other people down, and now watching it happen to himself. He just — he just wants to fucking wrestle. That's the only thing he wants.

 

Well, maybe.

 

When he looks back up, Leakee is silent again, face screwed up in confusion as if those words didn’t make sense. Looks, for once, like he doesn’t have anything smart to say, but Mox knows what’ll get that mouth moving again. He lets his legs fall open enticingly, hand running over the precious little fabric covering him. “Could really turn this into a party. Know plenty’a places we’d be alone.”

 

“Stop it.” Leakee’s mouth is pulled down at the corners, his eyes starting to turn that way, too, focusing on a spot somewhere beyond the wall — Mox doesn’t understand why he looks so somber when he’s offering him exactly what he wants.

 

He gives a loose shrug, moves his hand over to start palming his dick through the trunks. He’s not really feeling it, to be honest, but if Leakee would hurry up and get with the program, Mox is sure he could get there, too. “I got nowhere to go and no place to be. Everyone else is fuckin’ me over. Why na’you, too?”

 

Leakee barely even looks at him. “You’re drunk.”

 

“Mmm. Plenty’a beer here, once I find some more. You could be, too. ‘Sides, s’why you’re here, right? My ass looks good in these trunks, but I bet i’looks even better in bed with you.”

 

The distance between them is cut again when Leakee leans down and grabs Mox’s wrist. It’s not a tight grip, like he would expect — those fingers aren’t digging down into flesh, turning the skin around them white then black and blue. They’re firm but nearly gentle as Leakee drags his hand away from where he was touching himself, and Mox wants to shake him off but finds himself watching for whatever move Leakee will make next instead. “Stop,” he repeats, voice low and full of bass, and Mox is nodding absentmindedly before he realizes he’s doing it. “We need to get you up and walking around, try to sober you up before your match.”

 

“Won’t be the first time I ever fought after one too many,” and at the sound of Leakee’s voice echoing  _ One? _ in a disbelieving mutter, Mox gives him a sharp grin and doesn’t move from his spot when he tugs. There’s a drawn out moment where they’re staring, challenging each other, and he’s not sure exactly what Leakee sees in his face, but whatever it is makes him drop Mox’s hand with a grunt.

 

“Fine.” Leakee relents, moving away before Mox can reach for him. Maybe he is a little more impaired than he cares to admit, but he’s not about to concede to that. He doesn’t sound annoyed, either, just — more of that strange, melancholy resignation, like he didn’t expect Mox to listen to him in the first place or something. “Do you, uh—should get you some water, though, if nothing else.” Mox doesn’t know what to make of any of these developments.

 

“You’re bein’ nice to me,” he mumbles, squinting up at Leakee towering above him. Mox hates this, hates this feeling of being so far below him. He makes a move to start sliding back up the wall, but when his legs begin to shake a little, he gives up on that plan for now, allowing himself to collapse back to the floor. “You’re never nice to me.”

 

Leakee snorts rather unattractively. It makes Mox genuinely chuckle, despite himself. “I think you need to reassess that claim,” he says, arms crossed as he leans against the opposite wall. He looks so cool and detached, so unaffected, and Mox wants to pull himself together enough to get up and grab him by the collar, say  _ c’mere  _ and attempt to breathe some fire into him, but when he stares for too long there are two Leakees, and he's not sure which one to latch onto. “Besides, this coming from the guy who once told me I wasn’t worth remembering.”

 

“I was lyin’, so sue me,” he shrugs, still tilting his head as far back as he can until, eventually, with a sigh, Leakee drops down to sit across from him. Between the two of them, they’re blocking the entire hallway off. Mox reaches out with the toe of his boot and taps Leakee’s foot, crossed underneath him, before he even realizes he's moving. “S’not like I thought I’d get to keep you or anything.”

 

He can’t read the look Leakee is giving him. It’s like, it’s like something important, something he should recognize, but he doesn’t, he can’t.

 

“What?” he asks, mouth caught playing between a grin and a scowl even as he starts beating a rhythm out against the sole of Leakee’s shoe, because there's something that Leakee’s not telling him. He's keeping secrets, his face says, and Mox can't abide secrets unless he has his hands in them all.

 

Shifting to untwist his legs from beneath him, Leakee kicks at Mox’s foot to push it away. “You're slurring your words,” he mutters, finally glancing away and down the hall like he's looking for someone else. It's not fucking acceptable, not with Mox right in front of him and needing the sort of shitty pep talks he's come to expect, so he pushes more insistently against Leakee’s foot with a _hey_ , and when that doesn't work, he manages to swing his legs around to crawl over on his knees, right into Leakee’s space.

 

“Don't do that, don't—” Mox grabs at Leakee’s hair — it's so soft between his fingers, has it always been that way, he can't recall — twists his head back around to face him again, crowded close to the other man so he can't physically look away. Mox doesn't remember exactly what he didn't want Leakee to do, just that he normally shies away from being too close to him, like this, but for once he forgets to be uneasy and is instead — flattered isn't the right word, can’t be flattered when you already know you’re the best — but he's pleased about it, about the fact that his face is the only thing he sees reflected in Leakee’s eyes. Like Leakee wouldn't throw him away.

 

They’re just staring, nose to nose, breathing in each other’s air, when Leakee asks “Don’t what?”, and Mox doesn’t  _ know  _ — he just wants to stay right there all the time, so that whenever Leakee’s eyes light up or go dark, it’s because of him. Those two inches seem to disappear of their own accord, Mox’s lips suddenly on his, and as long as he’s here he might as well take advantage, so he kisses Leakee for all that he’s worth.

 

There’s hesitance on the other end, and that just won’t fucking fly, so Mox tugs at the hair in his hands, bites at a lower lip until he pulls something like a moan from deep in Leakee’s chest. He presses his tongue against Leakee’s lips, just to get them to part, and then Leakee slides fingers into Mox’s hair, palm cradling the side of Mox’s head, and kisses back like he’s starved for it, like it’s been months rather than a couple weeks, though maybe it’s all the same, and it’s _nice_. It’s the first nice thing that Mox can remember in days, Leakee surging up as best he can from his sitting position to meet Mox where he’s on his knees, legs spread wide to straddle Leakee’s thigh.

 

Mox is panting when he pulls away, can’t even bring himself to grin at Leakee, who looks back dazedly, mouth hanging open a little, and, god, Mox thinks, yeah, yeah, _maybe_. There are so many things Mox wants to do to him, right now, but the thought of his upcoming match finally drifts back across his mind, and he nearly whines at having to force his brain to think about that. Leakee seems to know exactly what’s going on, though, and tells him, “C’mon. I’ll walk you to Gorilla.” Mox backs away, enough to allow Leakee to lumber to his feet, and this time, when he offers his hand, Mox takes it.

 

Leakee drives him home, after, refuses to let Mox behind the wheel of his own car even though he just wrestled a thirty minute match, no problem, and he’s so fucking sick of other people making decisions that affect him. This one’s significantly better than the other, though, so he makes an effort to only be a little petulant as he curls himself up in the now-familiar front seat, gear stashed on his lap.

 

The ride to his place is silent. When they get there, he starts to get out of the car before noticing that Leakee isn't moving, hands back on the wheel even with the engine killed. Mox slowly slides backward, into the chair again with a grimace, knowing that whatever’s coming can't be good. “What?”

 

When Leakee does speak, what he says is, “I'm sorry.” It's enough to make him flinch, shoulders ducking while he holds in the gasp of air that feels like it’s been sucker punched out of him. The words aren’t something he was expecting to hear, not even sure he wants directed at him — never been his preference to have anyone putting their pity on him. Mox tries in vain to find the view of his front door through the windshield very interesting. “You’re not going to believe me. But you deserve—more than this, at least.”

 

Mox has never had much sympathy directed at him, certainly not enough to develop the type of thick skin he'd need to come out of this in one piece. As it is, the words slide under his skin, burrowing in until they make him itch all over again, but somewhere deeper in his chest, somewhere he can’t reach. “Trust me, you're one’a the last people I'd consult for opinions on what I deserve.” He scratches idly at his chest in an attempt to dispel whatever weird feeling that's settled there, his knee jiggling the bag resting on his legs. “You comin’ in or what? M’not fuckin’ sittin’ on my hands out here when they could be doin’ other things.”

 

Leakee looks like he has more to say, but Mox is done listening, climbing out of the car and slamming it shut, not looking back. The door to his place catches before he can treat it the same, Leakee slipping in after him and locking it behind him.

 

They’ve been here, together, a few times before, and Mox knows about what to expect by now. Leakee stripping him, fucking him, possibly staying the night or leaving, except: he’s not prepared for how slowly Leakee peels the fabric off of him, each move nearly cautious in a way he’s never been before, working each piece of clothing off as if navigating around several injuries no matter how frantically Mox is kissing him. He’s not prepared for that unhurried pace to follow them to the bed, Leakee pressing him down into the mattress and taking his sweet time with everything, even as Mox spits out words designed to spur him on. He’s not prepared for the way it flares in his stomach, burning hot throughout his entire body, everything on fire before Leakee even wraps a hand around him.

 

He’s not prepared for how much he likes it.

 

“Could get used to this,” he lets slip right after without meaning to, rolled over and practically draped over Leakee, loose-limbed and fucked out, occasionally tracing fingers lightly over the woven pattern of his tattoo, and that freaks him out. He could get used to there being another warm body in his bed. He doesn't think it would be as good if it were anyone else’s body. It freaks him out — he doesn’t want to. Doesn’t want anything about this to become routine, commonplace. What if it already has? “Post match fuck, nice kind of high,” Mox clarifies when he gets no response but a quizzical look.

 

Leakee, for his part, doesn't point out that there might not be a lot of matches left, which Mox is thankful for. “Well, you could get that any time really, couldn’t you. Don’t need me around for that.” He says it casually enough, but there’s the slightest waver to his voice that Mox sniffs out immediately. There’s something, he thinks, hidden behind the words. The two of them, they say a lot, most of it bullshit, if he’s being honest, but there’s always  _ something  _ else beneath it. Him and Leakee, they’re usually having two different conversations at once.

 

And suddenly, so many things make a lot more sense, viewing them in a slightly different light. There are a thousand throw-away comments and gestures, but for each one, there’s a smile that Leakee would try to hide or a laugh that would send a strange sort of chill up his spine — Mox feels another one now, a lot colder, and shakes with it.

 

He’s not feeling particularly brave, the effects of whatever alcohol had been lingering far gone by now, but Mox grits his teeth and manages to find it in himself to say, “Could be you.” He immediately regrets it — sounds far too much like a confession, and Mox doesn’t think he can hide from this revelation anymore.

 

It’s not just  _ something  _ he likes about Leakee. It’s the guy himself, and Mox has never had that, ever, before.

 

Leakee shifts underneath him — the way they’re laying, neither can see the other’s face — and there’s a pause that the sound of their breaths fill. “You—you’re joking, right? I mean, with football, and everything…”

 

And maybe, if Mox were more in his right fucking mind, he might have latched onto the hesitation, there, but he doesn’t want to have to search behind the words. Not when he said exactly what he meant.

 

“Not like I’m ever fuckin’ askin’, man,” he responds, except, well. He just did, didn’t he, and at least now he has his answer. He’s up and out of the bed before another second can pass, moving around the room like a whirlwind, throwing clothes on as he finds them. “You’ll forgive me for gettin’ the wrong impression, though, showin’ up for so many matches. Pretty sure no one ever fuckin’ asked you to do that, either. You made yourself look pretty goddamn desperate for my dick all on your own.”

 

The worst part isn’t that he doesn’t get to keep Leakee, because that was always a given — Mox knows that, he's known it all along. The worst part isn’t even that, despite knowing this, it’s still Leakee that he wants, that he wants around, anyway. No, the worst part, the very worst part, the thing that shoots sparks of pain through his clenched teeth and makes his eyes burn — god damn it, it stings, like falling on the knee he just scraped open, over and over again, except in his head, in his chest — is that, despite it all, despite all the bullshit and every reason not to, Mox wants Leakee here, and now, Leakee knows it.

 

Leakee knows it, and Mox can’t fucking live with that.

 

Leakee lets out a disbelieving chuckle, the sound of it blending into the dark of the rest of the room while he’s still lying half under the sheets of Mox’s bed. “Desperate? Really?” he asks, voice low and threatening, but that’s never been the thing about him that’s unnerved Mox. He catches Leakee’s eyes just enough to see that they don't quite match up with the rest of his mood, and he twists away again before he can convince himself that it's because there's something there when there isn't.

 

“That’s what I fuckin’ said, isn’t it?” Mox starts to pull on shoes over his bare feet, snarling with his need to just get away from this, right now, he needs to be anywhere else, how was he fucking stupid enough to let this happen— “I know your ass ain’t used to not gettin’ whatever you want, but the way you been chasin’ after me is _pathetic_.” He can hear a distant part of himself practically shouting  _ stop,  _ and it sounds a lot like Leakee had when he'd said the same thing earlier, but Mox plows on ahead, heedless to it anyway. “Can't find anyone willing to suck you off down south? S’not my problem. Pity fuck was fun and everything, but it’s so sad by now I’m startin’ to feel sorry for _myself_.”

 

The bed hasn’t moved, Leakee so still in it that Mox nearly wants to turn and check if he’s really turned into one of those statues he’s always silently compared him to. “Yeah,” Leakee speaks, just as Mox is heading for the exit, and he stops for a moment, has to listen, shoulders tight, because the tone of Leakee’s voice makes him think that whatever he’s about to say is going to hurt. “Knew you’d eventually feel something besides blind rage at the world. Didn’t think it’d just be fear.” 

 

Mox can’t tell if there’s any more, after that; the door slamming behind him drowns out the sound of any other possible words, and Leakee never starts chasing after him or anything, because why fucking would he? He twists and punches the brick edge of the building, as hard as he can, nearly crumples to his knees when he both hears and feels something crack in his hand, the swelling almost immediate, but a welcome distraction.

 

Every time the thought of what he’s traveling further away from tries to cross his mind, Mox flexes his right fist and has to bite his tongue to stop from crying out. It’s enough to keep him moving forward instead of rushing back, but he realizes, walking under the street lamps, hands shoved in his pocket, that he has nowhere to go. The room he escaped from was his.

 

He reaches the best possible solution nearly thirty minutes later. “What the fuck are you doin’ here, Jon?” Sami asks when he finally prys the door open. There's a wide scowl twisting his lips, making the rest of his face look suspicious and bitter. Sami used to be a sweet kid, Mox thinks, before he got ahold of him. Mox doesn't have much use for anything sweet, though, so that suits him just fine. Sami used to be sweet, but he's apparently still as stupid as ever, because he moves to the side just far enough to let Mox in.

 

Mox shoulder checks him as he enters, pushes him back and away from the doorway. “Can’t be at my own place, right now. Need to crash somewhere for the night.” The simple apartment looks about the same as Mox remembers it — nearly identical to his, they could practically live in the same place — but he doesn’t think too much about that, and doesn’t offer any more as he collapses on the couch with a groan.

 

“Yeah, make yourself at home,” Sami grouches, moving to stand in front of him, arms crossed. There’s not much of anywhere else to look, so Mox stares right back at him, challenging him to say a damn word about anything, because the last thing he feels like doing is talking about anything. “How does your mind even work, that you would think it’s even close to alright to show up here?” Mox scoffs at him, tries flexing his fist again when that sharp pain returns and a hiss escapes him. Sami looks at his hand where he’s shaking it out, says, “What’d you do?”

 

Mox swallows, moves his hand with a grimace again. “I hit somethin’ that wasn't supposed to hit back.” Sami rolls his eyes and disappears toward the kitchen, returning with a bulky towel, clacking from the ice wrapped up in it, and drops it next to Mox where he’s sitting.

 

“You’re a fuckin’ idiot,” he tells Mox, and though it sounds frustrated, he’s having trouble hiding the fondness, too. Mox picks the makeshift coldpack up and holds it to his knuckles, scraped and a little bloody. It’s been months, now, since he struck Sami down with harsh blows, and it’s not like they’ve spoken, since, but here he is on a couch he’s spent so much time on, trying to forget every shit detail of his day, and Sami isn’t smiling at him but Mox has kind of missed this. “What sorta shit has got you knockin’ on my door?”

 

Immediately, all the heat drains from Mox’s face, leaving him feeling as cold as the ice on his hand. He tries flexing that fist again, under the towel, but even that can’t chase thoughts of Leakee away, now. “Nothin’ important,” he says, but the lie burns on his tongue even as he tells it. It’s — it is important. But that probably doesn’t matter, anymore.

 

“You’re tellin’ me what’s goin’ on in the morning. Get real comfortable on that couch.” Sami is a better person than Mox, that’s for damn sure, and he bites his lip for an instant before giving a weak nod.

 

“Yeah. Thanks, I guess.” His voice is going hoarse almost entirely against his will.

 

He can't sleep for the life of him, though, tosses and turns for nearly two hours before he gets up and pulls his shoes on, growling under his breath, cursing the laces getting wrapped around his hands and Leakee and every single decision he has made in his life that led him to this point, including this one. When Mox leaves, he slams the door behind him hard enough that it echoes in the still air and bitterly hopes it wakes Sami up.

 

Twenty minutes later, his own apartment comes into sight. He isn't looking for a silver Volkswagen out of place, standing out like a sore thumb in the decrepit parking lot, so there's no need to sort through a multitude of conflicting feelings when it's not there. Didn’t think it would be.

 

The door is closed just as tightly as it had been when he slammed it shut, before, takes a little finesse with the handle to get it open, again. The bag, the clothes that littered the floor before are gone. The sheets, pulled back and rumpled, look no different than they do every time Mox crawls out of bed. Nothing's sitting out, nothing out of place any more so than he normally keeps it. There's no trace of Leakee anywhere in the apartment. He never had any permanence, here, despite thoughts that occasionally crept up to the contrary, and he certainly won't now. Makes it all the easier to wipe the memory away. 

 

In theory, at least.

 

Kicking off his shoes once more, Mox drops face first onto the mattress, springs squealing in protest under the sudden weight. That’s that, he tells himself, shifting uncomfortably to locate the soft spot he prefers, the one that's eluding him. No more feeling this way. Fucking snap out of it.

 

It's just, regret is weighing heavy between his shoulder blades, nearly suffocating him in the sheets where Leakee was kissing him just a few hours earlier. The feeling is new, and Mox doesn't know what to do with the helpless way his hands are reaching out to the cold bedspread like he'll find warm skin there, as if he's ever allowed it to linger before.

 

When he turns on his side in a desperate attempt to find a decent position, nose buried in the extra pillow, he's assaulted with the scent of spice and sweat and he tries to breathe through it, tries to breathe through his mouth until that’s even worse, until he can taste it and his eyes are stinging, so he puts the pillow in a headlock and punches it down into a little ball and throws it at the couch with a yell of frustration and tries not to think about how the bed feels too big.

  
Never should have shared it in the first place.


End file.
